“If any man come to [M]e, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be [M]y disciple.”                                                                                                                                                (Luke 14)

 

We can remember years ago, when mentioning this passage in Luke, a man in a service actually stopping me and demandingan explanation on the principle behind Christ’s teaching.
I readily admit that my Master has said some very outlandish things like, “…[I]f you are not for [M]e you are against [M]e,” and saying those that will be with Him must drink His Blood and eat His Flesh and stating very publically and categorically that if one does not believe Him to be the I Am of the Old Testament, one will certainly die in one’s sins.

The passage from Luke (14) fourteen is equally harsh and hard to take in. However, all that He says, no matter how harsh or how hard, is all true. So, when He says, those of us that will be with Him, must hate our family, He means it.

What does He mean though? In other Scripture the Christ-ian is told to love and honour parents, Christ-ians are told to love their wives, Christ-ians are told to love their children, Christ-ians are even told to Love their neighbor and their enemy. How then does Christ’s message in Luke (14) fourteen line up with other Scripture? How can we love our families and also hate them?

First of all, let us define terms and put things into perspective, and words into their righftul context. Christ is not instructing us to emotionally hate our families. Christ is instructing us to be fully prepared to go against the wishes, the likes, the desires of our loved ones if they counter or contradict Christ’s purposes and pleasures. There should not be and must not be any question within the Christ-ian mind that asks, “What should I do, who should I listen to?” Christ demands preeminence in all things.

This can be seen in the life of Abraham. God called Abraham to leave everything and to follow God’s unrevealed will for his life. This is also demonstrated when Abraham was willing to sacrifice Isaac to God. This fundamental and foundational Christ-ian principle can also be seen in the record of Jepthah and his daughter. John and James, also demonstrate this principle. When Christ called John and James to follow Him, they left their family business, their father, and all that they knew. Matthew gave up all to follow Christ. This truth cannot be overstated. This principle can be seen in the negative as well. When un-called men would approach Christ and ask if they could follow Him, He would tell them to give up everything before they could follow Him, but they would not. Because of their hold on life, they could not follow Christ.

“Blood is thicker than water.” If I am correct, this can be interpreted as meaning, the water of believer’s baptism will not replace one’s loyalty to family and kin. In other words, when it really come down to it, a person will always side with blood relatives and not their brethren in Christ. Is this true?

If we take Christ at His Word and we be loyal to Him and our holy calling, it cannot be true. One’s loyalty must reside, abide, and remain with one’s Christ-ian, Blood-bought family at the expense of family and kin relationships.

Why must it be this way? We will give (2) two reasons:
1. Christ demands the preeminence and the complete giving over of ourselves as a living sacrifice unto Him. A sacrifice has no more ties with life or the living. The Christ-ian is commanded to *die daily, to *die to self, to *be crucified with Christ, and to *crucify the world. The Christ-ian is further commanded to *deny even himself and to *take up the cross and to *follow Christ and to follow Christ Alone and to never look back (Remember Lot’s wife).
2. In the time of tribulation, we are told that family and family love will grow cold and family members will betray family members that are Christ-ian.

To be clear, we are not saying that you should cut all family and friend ties. We are not saying you should look at your family and friends with hate and disgust. We are not saying or implying that Christ-ians should leave their families, their careers, or the life that they know. I don’t think any of you would think we were saying such things, but we would rather be safe than sorry…you understand.

To summarize our article:
Christ does not expect us or command us to drop everything and to hate everybody and to love Him only. However, He is saying we should be prepared to do so if called upon.

A couple of hopefully helpful analogies:
1. Certain members of certain military branches keep a “go bag.” This bag speaks to their (this is going to sound cold) readiness and preparedness to leave everything behind, family included, in order to serve the country.
2. The smart or rather wise and prudent employee also has a “go bag” in the case of their unexpected termination. In this bag is all that they would need to pick up and go, leaving everything else behind.

Some may think this principle as being extreme and radical, but this principle is a foundational principle that Christ-ians must build their lives upon.

Godspeed.