Let me first

A word for the week

What does it actually cost to follow Jesus? He was never coy about it, and this short passage is one of the bluntest places he says so. Three people come to him wanting to follow, and to each one he says something that sounds almost harsh, until you see what he is really doing. He is refusing to let anyone sign up without knowing the price.

The first man is all enthusiasm. I will follow you wherever you go, he says. It is the kind of thing people say in a rush of feeling. Jesus does not thank him for it. He says the foxes have holes and the birds have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head. In other words: do you know what you are volunteering for? I do not even have a home. Following me means a road with no guaranteed bed at the end of it. He is sobering the man up, because a choice made in a rush of feeling rarely survives the first cold night.

The second man Jesus calls himself: follow me. And the man says, let me first go and bury my father. This sounds entirely reasonable, and it is the line people stumble over most, because Jesus answers, let the dead bury their own dead; you go and proclaim the kingdom. It sounds cold until you understand it. Most likely the father was not yet dead; the phrase meant something closer to let me wait until I have settled all my family duties, which could be years. The man is asking, underneath it, for someday. And Jesus knows what someday is worth: it is the one day that never arrives.

The third man says, I will follow you, but let me first say goodbye to those at home. Even this, Jesus will not simply wave through. No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom. Anyone who has tried to plow a straight line knows you cannot do it looking over your shoulder; the furrow wanders the moment your eyes leave the front. He is naming the divided heart, the follower who is always half-turned toward what he left, and so never quite goes forward.

Notice the word that ties all three together: first. Let me first bury my father. Let me first say goodbye. I will follow, first let me. Each of them means to come, truly, but each has a first in front of it, a condition, a not-quite-yet. And Jesus keeps putting his finger on exactly that word, because that little first is where most people quietly never start. The way is not lost by the people who refuse it outright. It is lost by the people who fully intend to walk it, right after one more thing, and the one more thing never ends.

This is a hard word, and it is meant to be. He leaves you your family and your duties; the question he presses is whether he is actually first, or only first-after. A follower with a hundred firsts ahead of Jesus is still at the planning stage. The cost is not that you must give up everything you love. The cost is that you cannot keep him in second place and call it following.