But Jesus said to him, ‘Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.’” (Matthew 8:22).
We live in a comfortable country in a comfortable world at a comfortable time.
Yes – we have lost of problems… We are experiencing a per-capita recession in Australia right now. And that means that though as a whole our economy has grown over the last year or so, most of that growth is the result of population growth. What has actually happened in real terms is that if we split that growth up by person in the population in this country, most people (at a personal level) are doing worse off financially than they had been before the COVID19 pandemic…
And yet – even despite the pressures on us caused by the rising cost of living, our lives are still relatively comfortable. We generally have clothes to wear and electricity to use and homes to live in. For many of us, we do not experience war and violence each day. For most people in our community, their children can access education (even free education as supplied by our public schools) and we live a life of relative freedom…
And perhaps, because we are so comfortable, it becomes very easy for us to think that everything in life should be comfortable… And yet – our faith is NOT a faith of comfort.
In fact, nowhere in Sacred Scripture did Christ ever say that life would be comfortable. Instead, He told us to take up our Cross and follow Him. He told us that we would be very UNCOMFORTABLE. And that discomfort allows us to build our strength for the journey HOME…
“A scribe said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head.’ Another of the disciples said to him, ‘Lord, let me first go and bury my father.’ But Jesus said to him, ‘Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.’” (Matthew 8:18-22).
And this is really the essence of the discomfort that I am speaking about. True Christians do not belong to this world and therefore are detached from it – without even a home in which to lay their heads. And Christ does not wait for us to prepare ourselves and “bury our dead” so to speak – which is just another way of saying care for our families and do our familial duties…
And I have been thinking about this today, because it is clear that there is much that I put in the way of my God in the name of comfort. And I wonder today if all the work and socialising and entertainment will be any consolation on the day that my Beloved calls to me to stand before Him during the final judgement of my soul. For today it seems that I take comfort in all the wrong places…
For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.
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