IRRESISTIBLY CALLED TO THE HARVEST
Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, Year C
Analysis by Matthew DeLoera
1After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go. 2He said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. 3Go on your way. See, I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves. 4Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and greet no one on the road. 5Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this house!’ 6And if anyone is there who shares in peace, your peace will rest on that person; but if not, it will return to you. 7Remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the laborer deserves to be paid. Do not move about from house to house. 8Whenever you enter a town and its people welcome you, eat what is set before you; 9cure the sick who are there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ 10But whenever you enter a town and they do not welcome you, go out into its streets and say, 11‘Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you. Yet know this: the kingdom of God has come near.’
16Whoever listens to you listens to me, and whoever rejects you rejects me, and whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me. 17The seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, in your name even the demons submit to us!” 18He said to them, “I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning. 19See, I have given you authority to tread on snakes and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing will hurt you. 20Nevertheless, do not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”
“We see a limitless field of neighbors dying to be liberated, from those oppressed to those shackled by their oppressive views, and from those who are hated to those blinded by their hatred.”
DIAGNOSIS: Striving to Prevail over Enemies
Step 1-Initial Diagnosis (External Problem): Victory over all Demons!
Jesus appointed the seventy to do remarkable things, and they did as commanded. They subjected themselves to voluntary poverty and the charity of strangers. They granted peace, cured the sick, and liberated people from demons. They reached all the places where Jesus wanted them to go. Yet, when they return, the disciples say nothing about any of these remarkable things, other than to rejoice at one thing – “the demons submit to us!” (v. 17) In response, Jesus reprimands, “Do not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you.” (v 20) In our time of constantly increasing political scapegoating and governmental oppression of marginalized folks, we might hear occasional stories of some who act in their behalf or even suffer with them. However, we seem to hear an overwhelming volume of verbal sparring between factions, each claiming rhetorical or moral victory over the other, as if prevailing over the enemy is really the most important thing.
Step 2-Advanced Diagnosis (Internal Problem): Disappointments Downplayed
The power of Jesus’ name never fails to astonish. It has always been shocking to witness a word actually doing something in a world filled with words that do nothing. To their credit, the disciples at least acknowledge this by testifying, “Lord, in your name.” (v. 17) Yet the disciples don’t rejoice about folks having been liberated but instead seem wholly fixated by the memory of feeling flush with power over the demons they cast out. Then again, perhaps this easily drowned out the disappointments they felt from all the rejections they faced, as Jesus had warned from the outset, “whenever you enter a town and they do not welcome you.” (v. 10) Our world is no less adversarial now. It’s so much easier to just cut off our enemies and consider it our moral victory over them. It’s much more painful to endure the frustration of keeping close to folks who we detest, even if we know there’s a slight chance of witnessing a surprising shred of compassion from them.
Step 3-Final Diagnosis (Ultimate Problem): Rejecters Rejected
Jesus deliberately sent the disciples into a harsh world – “See, I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves.” (v. 3) True, he sent them with the barest of provisions – “Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and greet no one on the road.” (v. 4) Yet he equipped them with his name and with the promise that “the kingdom of God has come near to you” (v. 9) so that God’s will would be done. But what will they do when the name seems to lose power, as some disciples had recently discovered by failing to cast out demons? “I begged your disciples to cast it out, but they could not.” (Lk 9:40) Or, what will they do when they behold the one with the powerful name nailed to a cross and dead? Well, we witness what they do when that name then invites the same violence of empire upon their own bodies – they reject Jesus’ promise and perhaps just like Peter desperately insist, “I do not know the man!” (Matt 26:74)
How often we turn to scripture and the name of Jesus as means to level our enemies and reveal their religious hypocrisy. And when these attempts inevitably fail, we bitterly condemn, “Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you.” (v. 11) But we stubbornly omit the promise Jesus gives, “the kingdom of God has come near” (v. 11) because we can’t accept for it to be true for them. We’re adamant that they don’t deserve it. And truth be told, after becoming inured to the world’s unfettered injustice, we likely no longer believe it in ourselves, but merely pay lip service. But in rejecting the promise, we also reject the promiser who warned, “whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.” (v. 16) And always practicing what he preaches, we should not be surprised for Jesus to level that very condemnation at us while wiping our dust from his feet.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty
PROGNOSIS: Called to Selfless Service
Step 4-Initial Prognosis (Ultimate Solution): No Longer Abandoned
In dying on the cross, Jesus became to everyone as nothing more than dust shaken off by the world. Jesus makes our dust his own. And in rising from the dead, he raises us out of the dust. He became utterly unshakable from his disciples or from us. And in keeping with his good news, he is true to his word, and practices exactly as he preaches. He comes to “every town and place where he himself intended to go.” (v. 1) Hence, Jesus returns to his disciples and does exactly what he had commanded them to do in the first place. He pronounces, “Peace be with you,” (Lk 24:36) and asks for something to eat, so “they gave him a piece of broiled fish.” (Lk 24:42) So Jesus comes to us as well, pronouncing peace to us. Except, he does not ask us for our leftovers, but instead miraculously feeds us fully with his own body and blood, as a promise to never abandon us.
Step 5-Advanced Prognosis (Internal Solution): Possibilities Opened
Though the disciples failed to recount any of the other things they did, Jesus exclaims, “I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning.” (v. 18) Perhaps due to Jesus’ imparted faith, it never occurred to them to be even remotely surprised by any of their other deeds, expecting as much from the power of Jesus’ name and thanking God in those moments. After all, they must have placed a staggering amount of trust in Jesus to so readily heed his high call in the first place, and this suggests quite a hopefulness and openness to new possibilities, or even an entirely new creation. We experience likewise by the same faith that Jesus miraculously imparts into our hardened hearts as well, causing us to admit that we don’t know the whole story regarding the neighbors we otherwise detested. Granted, we still hate rejection and the unknown just as much as the seventy did, yet somehow faith miraculously grants us a sustaining hope.
Step 6-Final Prognosis (External Solution): Irresistibly Called
Jesus proposes, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore, ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” (v. 2) So, we set to work, because we see a limitless field of neighbors dying to be liberated, from those oppressed to those shackled by their oppressive views, from those who are hated to those blinded by their hatred. Really, despite appearances to the contrary, who isn’t truly oppressed? And we don’t feel any need to clamor for praise or affirmation about our service, because the laborers live to do what needs to be done. It’s just who they have been created to be, and the call is irresistible.
