Jesus shocks us into attention today by telling us to turn our backs on our families and everyone we love, or we cannot be his disciple! This is a statement very few of us can swallow. Turning our backs on family and loved ones makes little sense to most people, and it seems the very opposite of what the Gospel commands! How can we love our neighbor and ourselves and, at the same time, turn our back on those who are closest to us—those we love, those who often present us with our greatest challenges around loving? It’s a conundrum until we realize Jesus’ first-century Palestinian listeners aren’t disturbed by his words. This is a familiar style of speech to them. It is used to underscore and emphasize a point, increasing the importance of what is being said. No one in the crowd would have taken him literally to mean they should renounce (or hate!) their families and loved ones. So what is Jesus saying, then? What is his point? I think it comes down to the message he delivered to Mary Magdalene when he spoke to her before the empty tomb that pre-dawn morning following his crucifixion. “Don’t cling to me,” he said. Don’t cling. “If you will follow me you must let go.” Clinging is a fear-based response to the threat of loss, and all change brings loss. Clinging is the opposite of freedom, and disciples must have freedom. Jesus’ final words to Mary that morning were “go and tell my sisters and brothers all I have told you.” Go and tell; spread the word. We must have freedom to move, freedom to think, freedom of mind and heart if we are to be given a mission and trusted to carry it out. Detachment from anything that would hold us back, therefore, is an ongoing requirement for every disciple. It is an uphill journey for most of us and, in many ways, detachment is the central challenge and theme of every life, conscious or not.
When I was in college I had a friend, Margaret, who told me this story. Growing up she lived above the banks of a river much like the McKenzie. In the summer her dad would take her and her sister to a clearing about a mile or so up-river, have them help him maneuver their canoe into the water and let the river carry them all downstream. Margaret loved everything about it. She learned the ways of the river, learned to recognize dangerous areas, and gained skill in navigating the milder rapids of late summer. When she was thirteen, as a rite of passage, her father took her by herself to that same clearing they always used, helped her put the canoe in the water, and told her he would meet her at their accustomed spot downstream. He knew her skills and trusted her, he said. With that, he left. She was on her own.
She told me she sat there in the canoe, terrified, for what seemed like forever. She wanted to trust herself, but the memories of early summer canoe runs with her father—an extremely accomplished canoeist—came rushing into her mind. She remembered rapids that threatened to capsize the canoe, thrilling at the time because she completely trusted her dad. But here she was by herself now, and the river was waiting. She felt paralyzed; couldn’t make herself move. “I just clung to the shore with every ounce of strength,” she said, “and it was only the thought of my father waiting below that prompted me, eventually, to put my paddle in the water and trust myself at least a little, as he trusted me.”
I made it, she said. At times it was really scary and I would have panicked except for hearing my father’s voice in the back of my mind, guiding my strokes, calling my attention to a particularly difficult spot and telling me how to ride the current. When I got to the place we always landed, there he was—waiting. He was smiling from ear to ear, excited, arms wide and rushing to meet me. “You did it!!” he yelled and grabbed me tight in his arms. “I knew you could do it, and you did!!”
This is the story of our lives. This is how God teaches, guides, encourages, shows faith in us, and sends us on our way. We have to let go and trust life’s river if we are to be disciples of Jesus, the one making his way to Jerusalem despite the rapids he knows lie ahead. We can’t cling to the shore, can’t cling to our fathers and mothers or brothers and sisters. We can’t cling to anything that promises safety or position, anything that blinds or deafens us to the voice of Spirit that continually tells us to let go of the shore and push off into the river. Like Paul we are destined to risk our limited and limiting beliefs, because life will insist that we grow and change. What really matters is that we free ourselves of everything that ties us to the shore as well as anything that would obscures or block the voice of Holy Wisdom. She is our mentor and our guide.
Risk is the cross we must carry. Picking up our life challenges and carrying them with faith and humility is the opposite of hiding behind any of the facades social conventions might offer. It’s the opposite of being held hostage by fear. The drive to eliminate the threat of change, to imprison its agents and obliterate its voice will never silence the Spirit who weaves her watery forces through our lives. The cross of change is ever with us and will never be defeated. It is life itself, God’s unending creativity sprouting new opportunities for the development of Christ-infused souls. Being a follower of Jesus requires that we be free of everything that binds, that blinds and deafens, that holds us hostage to a way of being that limits or prevents growth.
Jesus orders Mary not to “cling” and, in this one statement, sends a signal to all of us that ‘detachment’ is the path of discipleship. Detachment leads to freedom which is the cross as well as the glory of the children of God.
As always, when I come back to the Sophia Christi website, it is like coming home! What a beautiful image of risk and trust following the river of life. I so wish you were closer to the southern Oregon coast. Thank you for publishing your words of wisdom so we can share them.