Today’s Bible reading

Read Luke 9:57-62

Now it happened as they journeyed on the road, that someone said to Him, “Lord, 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.” — Luke 9-57-58

More thoughts for meditation

Who was that someone who said that to Jesus? Can you imagine how you might have said it? What if it was you? What if it was you who said that sentence? Pause for a moment to wonder how you would say it. How would you feel when you said it?

“Lord, I will follow wherever you go.”

Are you reaching out for a connection? Like a child saying “Mama?” for no other reason but to know she’s there? Are you afraid? Or just checking? Or something else?

Are you bold? Brash? Bravado barely covering over your other feelings? Are you joyful and oblivious? Living in the now, not worried about tomorrow, death be damned? Jesus DID just say that the Son of Man would have to die. 

“Lord, I will follow wherever you go.”

Are you sure of it? Or are you testing it out? Will I follow wherever he goes? Do I even know what that means?

Jesus answers. He is the mother who IS always there, but he is not the mother who guarantees a warm cozy resting place. This mother is not like the animal mother who makes a hiding place for her kits and chicks. Jesus offers a purpose and a direction that makes a path towards a deeper and more permanent rest than anything we have yet known. 

And he keeps on moving. Will you move with him?

Suggestions for action

At our At-Home Sunday Meeting we kept moving with our altar ritual. We are transforming objects that might have been symbols of death into symbols of life and hope. Instead of discarding these little scraps of desolation we are uplifting them and honoring them. We are putting them in plain sight to remember how much of us we can put in the light (all of us — our whole person). 

This week the object is “something that can hold something” Details at circleofhope.net/lent. Try it out and share it if you’re so inclined. If you use #deaththroughlife it might encourage others as well.