Who Do I Follow?
“How long will you go on limping between two different opinions?” (1 Kings 18:21). This is the question Elijah puts to the people of Israel gathered at Mt. Carmel. It is an interesting phrase. Perhaps in America, we would use the phrase – “How long will you go on believing you can have your cake and eat it, too?” Once the cake is eaten, you can’t have it. You can’t have two incompatible things. The Israelites could not have two incompatible gods, and neither can we. What had gone wrong with the Israelites? You could probably make an argument for many things, but I would like to propose that the issue started with their priorities.
I’m sure many of you have heard statements similar to “show me your five closest friends and I will tell you who you are.” What about if you listed your five favorite books? Or the top five people you watch on social media? Most telling – how do you spend your time and money? All of these things ultimately show your priorities.
Jesus gives a lesson in priorities via a parable in Luke 14:15-24. To summarize this parable, a man was giving a great banquet, and invitations had been sent out well ahead of time. When the day of the banquet arrives, he then tells a servant to go and alert those who were invited that all is ready. Now, when all IS ready, the invited start to give all their excuses. One bought oxen, one bought a field, and one got married. The master becomes irate and tells the servant to extend the invitation to those who weren’t originally invited and would generally be the outcasts of society.
To give some background setting to this parable, Jesus is at a Sabbath dinner in the house of a ruler of the Pharisees. He has already given a parable on the value of humility to this ruler, and then other guests, most likely feeling a little uncomfortable over this perceived social faux pas from Jesus, try to change the subject by stating “blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the Kingdom of God.” Never one to let a teaching moment pass, Jesus tells them the parable of the master and the great feast. Jesus wants them to understand that those who were “invited” will make excuses. Ultimately, the feast wasn’t really a priority for the invited. They didn’t put it on their calendar, and life got in the way. They were like the thorny soil in the parable of the Sower and were caught up in the cares and riches and pleasures of life.
I, like these dinner guests with Jesus, believe that everyone who is part of the kingdom of God is blessed. However, I often must ask myself if I believe that statement so much that I make it my top priority to be ready to go to the feast in the Kingdom. There is a quote that has been attributed to Aristotle: “…we are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.” Aristotle believed that virtue was a golden mean between two vices and that to gain virtue it took effort, work, and practice. You had to prioritize living a virtuous life. So, why am I telling you about Aristotelian ethics? Because if we want to accept the invitation Christ offers, we must be prepared when all is ready, and that is going to take effort, work, and practice. I can painfully and honestly say that all too often I find excuses to get out of this effort, work, and practice. I find excuses for not praying, excuses for not spending time in the Word, and way too often, excuses for not serving others as I should. I get caught up in my own cares and the busyness of life. Or worse, I get caught up in wasteful leisure – entertainment meant to numb my cares and worries rather than useful ways to build a community to help further my walk with Christ.
If you have never tried the practice of really tracking your time on any given day, you might try it sometime, and it may be surprising. I have found in my own life that I always find time for the things I have made a priority. It may be hard, and I may even have to make sacrifices in order to do the thing I have prioritized, but somehow, I can make it work. We show our priorities via our time and resources, and Jesus makes it clear that there absolutely WILL be a cost to serve Him. Although we so often can believe that somehow life today makes it harder to follow Jesus, that is one more excuse Satan has let us fall prey to. Throughout the history of mankind, from the fall of Adam and Eve until now, humans have struggled with finding the golden mean. We lean toward one vice or another, and the proper solution for learning to live a virtuous life means taking up a cross and following Christ - which is WORK! I pray for you and also for me that we will prioritize this work and be ready and waiting to follow Jesus into the glorious feast that is waiting for us after this earthly journey.
