I think that in our current society and most likely in the entire history of Christianity there has been a question about how Christian we are supposed to be. What I mean by this is just how much of our life needs to be spent doing recognizably Christian activities and how much can be reserved for other things. Sometimes, this question is asked out loud and sometimes something of an unconscious consensus is reached, but whatever the case most people have come to some sort of conclusion about just how Christian they personally need to be in order to consider themselves Christian and the answer generally lies somewhere between St Francis of Assisi and Hugh Hefner. But what is really at the heart of this question is how much of our life do we need to sacrifice to God – is going to Church on Christmas and Easter enough, or is it every Sunday? Do we need to also throw in a Bible Study and perhaps grace before meals? If we pray while we are driving does that count for something? What about if we invite a friend to church or wear a cross necklace? I admit it is something of an odd question, but I think that most people who call themselves Christian have answered it without really giving it too much thought. When I was deployed in Qatar we had data on how many people at Al Udeid Air Base identified as Christian. If I remember right it was at least 80% or somewhere around 8,000 people. However our average weekly worship attendance generally came in at about 400 or around 5% of the population that considered themselves to be Christian. Now some people had work schedules that prevented them from coming, but most did not. Meaning roughly 90% of people on base who claimed to be Christian saw no link between their worship attendance and their understanding of themselves as being Christian. And so this brings up the question that we should ask ourselves and that is how much Christianity do we have in our lives? That is what are the actions, beliefs and general way of life that one needs to live in order to be a Christian?
Well today’s Gospel has an answer to this question and as you probably guessed it asks a little more of us than putting a plastic Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer on our lawn during the month of December. So here we go with this answer: Jesus, “Called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.’” Okay, well obviously there is a lot there and it does not sound very easy, so let’s get started talking about what Jesus expects of us.
The first part of being a Christian or follower of Jesus according to Jesus himself is that you are supposed to take up your cross and follow. Just as a quick side note before we go on, it is interesting that whenever you read about cults they talk about how they lure you in with the nice sounding things and only tell you about the really weird stuff once they are sure that you are fully committed. That is not the case with Jesus, he puts it right out there – grab a cross and come along. Now obviously Jesus is not saying that everyone who follows him will end up being crucified, even though we know that some did and some still do. By using such stark language he does imply that being a follower of him does not mean that life is going to be smooth. It is interesting that people, myself included, will often have a crisis of faith when there is something that has gone wrong in their lives. We will ask questions like how can God have allowed something like this to happen. And it is an understandable question, but we can’t say that Jesus promised us a rose garden. Jesus seems to explain being a follower of his as someone who should expect some suffering and should be someone who is willing to give everything for the sake of the Gospel proudly proclaiming their love for Jesus.
If you were to put everything that is in this verse on a job description I assume that my response would be that they seem to expect a lot. And so to return to the question I asked at the beginning about just how much Christianity one needed to be Christian it would seem that the answer is quite a bit. Christianity is not something that is part time; something that we can pick up or put down based on what else it is that we have to do. Jesus is not asking for part time followers, that is people who sign up in the same way that they may sign up for a bowling league or book club. It is not something that takes part of our being, but rather all of it. And I know this may sound frightening. To me it can conjure up images of guys on street corners waving placards telling us to repent. Full time Christianity seems to break that most sacred injunction for Episcopalians which is to not be tacky. But if Christianity is really true and if as Peter said when some were falling away because of the toughness of the message, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” The reason we do any of this really should not be out of preference or convenience but should rather be because it is true – Jesus is the only one that has the words of eternal life.
The former chaplain of the United States Senate Dick Halverson once said, “In the beginning the church was a fellowship of men and women centering on the living Christ. Then the church moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome, where it became an institution. Next it moved to Europe where it became a culture, and, finally, it moved to America where it became an enterprise.” As Americans it would seem that we are very comfortable with the enterprise model of Christianity, because it works the way everything else does including the ability to be ignored or taken in under our own terms. But that is not what Jesus tells us today is the case when we sign up. Christianity and being Christian is not simply an activity or a pastime but is supposed to occupy who we are. Today Jesus begins with something of a warning about the possibility of suffering but then goes onto explain that the consuming nature of being a follower of his is like losing your life. It is a giving up of our whims and desires and submitting them all to Jesus. Other places this is described as dying to self, that is giving up the ego, giving up that which we put ahead of Jesus and his saving message.
There is often a question in Christian circles about when the Church will return to the prominence that it had in years past.And, honestly, I do not know the answer to that question but the thing I do know is that we who call ourselves Christian might want to spend more time on actually being Christian, on dying to self and being born anew filled with the love of God.When the question is answered to how Christian do we need to be the answer really is 100%.We are not to