Luke 13:31-35
“Are You Willing?”
By Rev. Kenneth Emerson Sauer,
Pastor of Parkview United Methodist Church,
Newport News, VA
www.parkview-umc.org.
Have any of you ever met a person or worked with a person who just didn’t seem to like you—for no apparent reason?
What do many of us do when this happens?
Well, we try to be nice to that person.
We want that person to like us.
We don’t understand why they do not, and so we go way out of our way to be friends with that person.
But what happens in so many of these situations?
So often, that person who dislikes us continues to dislike us, and even becomes more and more mean to us or whatever…
…the more we try to win their affection.
This is very painful and very frustrating.
It’s also very confusing.
I’ve often found myself—when confronted with these kinds of situations—thinking, gee, if someone was being as nice to me as I am being to this person…
…I would think that person was the greatest! I would want to be friends with that person. I would be so overwhelmed by their nice-ness toward me that I couldn’t help but be nice back.
Just try to imagine how Jesus feels.
He has done everything to show His love for us…unconditionally…and yet…for some reason…so many of us don’t love Him back!
In our Gospel Lesson for this morning we see Jesus in sorrow over those who will not only ultimately reject Him…
…but will put Him through the most horrible of deaths.
Look at verse 34 again: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!”
Jesus’ lament over Jerusalem is reminiscent of how King David mourned the death of his son Absalom—despite the fact that Absalom had tried to overthrow his father.
In 2 Samuel chapter 18 we see one of the most moving expressions of a father’s love for his son—despite all that his son had done.
King David cried out: “O my son Absalom! My son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you—O Absalom, my son, my son!”
Is this not what Jesus did for those of us who are willing to believe?
In the movie, “The Passion Of The Christ,” one of the criminals on the cross hears Jesus pray: “Father forgive them.”
At this, the criminal looks down at the high priest who represents God’s chosen people and says: “Look, he’s praying for you.”
The high priest just turns and walks away.
How many of us, just turn and walk away from the love of Christ?
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem…” cries the heartbroken Christ—with a yearning and a sob.
How often does our casual worldliness break His heart, and yet many of us are neither aware of this nor care.
Here we have a picture of reality.
God has created us with a freewill.
And Jesus’ willingness to gather us together, “as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings” is answered by humankind’s: “I am not willing!”
If God forced us to love Him, our love would not be real.
The only real love comes from a willing obedience.
Jesus will not make us love Him.
He will not legislate our love nor control our wills.
He will not walk into our hearts without permission.
How many of us, most often in our young bachelor or bachelorette days, have put our love on the line only to have that love rejected?
Maybe we fell head over heals for some young woman or man who attracted our attention.
It might have started with smiles in the lunch line, hellos in the hallways of school.
And then the bolder: phone numbers were exchanged, there were a few dates.
And then, the overbearingly mushy: say…on a park bench in the middle of campus, on Valentine’s Day, we nauseatingly pour out our hearts in a speech that rivals a Shakespearean sonnet.
It probably makes us gag to think about it now.
But it was not to be.
We got the drift eventually.
She or he was never home when we called.
We never passed each other in the hallway anymore.
Word got back to us that this person was dating someone else.
Unrequited love for a young person is as close to the end of the world as one may ever come.
Now Jesus’ desire for us, no doubt, is a lot different than this.
But it’s similar in this regard: Jesus is willing to humble Himself…to make Himself vulnerable in order to get our attention.
He likens himself to a hen.
Out of all the animals that Jesus could have chosen as a metaphor for Himself, He chooses a hen.
He could have chosen the powerful eagle of the Book of Exodus—“I bore you on eagle’s wings.”
God is likened to a lion in the Book of Hosea.
But a hen?
What kind of a chance is a hen going to have against the likes of a fox such as Herod?
Some Pharisees warn Jesus this morning that Herod wants to kill Him.
No surprise here.
Herod was a deadly enemy.
Herod of Antipas, son of Herod the Great, wanted his father’s title: “King of the Jews”; but the Romans hadn’t bestowed it on him yet.
Herod wasn’t real confident in his power, and he presided over a court that was full of corruption.
Herod had already chopped off the head of John the Baptist at a wild party.
A hen’s head won’t matter much.
Put it on the chopping block and be done with all this squawking about salvation, love, peace and poor people.
How annoying.
In verses 31-32 we read: “At that time some Pharisees came to Jesus and said to him, ‘Leave this place and go somewhere else. Herod wants to kill you.’
He replied, “Go tell that fox, ‘I will drive out demons and heal people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.”
Calling Herod a “fox” was a dangerous insult, since foxes were considered to be creatures of vulgar cunning and craftiness.
In any event, Jesus’ reply is a sign of Jesus’ courage.
No Herod or host of demons could stop him from doing what He came to do.
And no Herod or host of demons could stop Jesus from loving humankind so much…that He would willfully go to the Cross…
…pay the death penalty for sin…
…so that any person who is willing can and will be forgiven, born again, made anew, given eternal life!
Jesus called Herod a “fox,” and foxes have always had a certain allure over God’s creatures, in this or in any century.
They might not be as bizarre and murderous as Herod, but foxes still woo away the hearts of those whom God loves.
And the thing is: Jesus will not force us from deciding to follow the fox.
Jesus can walk on water and raise the dead, but He will not force us to love Him.
He will not stop us from slamming the door in His face, as we go out into the darkness defenseless against the many Herods that are waiting in the shadows.
One of the hardest things in life is loving someone who is not willing to love us back.
So what is Jesus’ plan?
What’s He going to do now?
Amazingly, His plan is to keep offering the love of a mother hen; keep spreading his wings.
He will offer His life on our behalf.
He will follow us into the darkness we have chosen for ourselves, over and over again, but there will be a time that it will be too late for us to come to Him.
If we look closely at Jesus hanging on the Cross, His arms outstretched, the span of his reach on that wood will begin to resemble the loving wings of a mother hen, gathering up her chicks in a love that doesn’t make sense but breaks our hearts if we look long enough.
Jesus doesn’t count on the world ever seeing or understanding such love.
And even as He hangs there with hands nailed to a tree, he will not make us love Him.
He will not make us accept His love.
But His desire for us is here.
Always, eternally here.
“How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!”
Are we willing?
Here and now the choice confronts us: to receive Jesus so that His love may protect us, or to deny Him—to His heartbreak and our desolation.
There is one thing Jesus desires but will not control.
He desires our will.
Our proud, defiant control over our own destinies.
To relinquish that to Jesus is both the hardest and the sweetest thing we’ll ever do.
Let us Pray: Dear Holy Parent, we have assembled here today to marvel at the way You sent Your Son into Jerusalem and to the Cross for our sins. We look with amazement at the way You love us when we really don’t deserve it. Teach us what our response ought to be today as a congregation, like little chicks whose mother hen want to gather them under her wings. In Jesus’ name and for His sake we pray. Amen.
