IN the 1990s there was an advert on British television for McCain’s Oven Chips which you may remember. In it a young girl was asked: ‘Sophie, who do you love more: Daddy or chips?’ Sophie’s Dad then pinches a chip off her plate, at which point the little girl answers: ‘Chips!’ The ad was endearing and amusing, but it relates to a central question of today’s Gospel: Whom do we love more? It is difficult question to answer. Naturally we love our family and friends. They are important to us. At the same time, Our Lord’s question challenges us to see what is really important.

Jesus tells His disciples:

“Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” (Mt 10:37-38)

Our Lord is using this extreme statement to make a point: God should be the most important person in our life. God should come first, before everything and everyone else. This is not to say that family is not important, just that our relationship with God is primary. There is no room for half measures. To follow Jesus is to take up a cross: to embrace pain and suffering for His sake. While Jesus is preaching the Good News of the Kingdom in Galilee, His mind is on the Cross. Christ knows what His mission entails — the pain, agony, and isolation. He calls us to follow Him, to be willing to lay down our lives just as He did. Jesus is also quoting here from the prophet Micah:

‘for the son treats the father with contempt, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house. But as for me, I will look to the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me.’ (Micah 7:6-7)

The Kingdom of God makes demands on its followers. It disrupts established patterns of behaviour and relationships, because the Kindom is a new thing. As Christians, our primary allegiance is not to our family on earth, but rather our family in Heaven.

Our Lord then deepens His teaching with a paradox: 

“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Mt 10:39)

To follow Jesus is to walk the way of the Cross, and to embrace suffering. We find our true life in Christ. We lose it for His sake, and in losing it we find it. The point is that we remain ‘in Christ’. Thanks to this relationship nothing else matters. And yet, because of our relationship with Jesus, we receive from God all that we could ever want: including God himself, united to us for eternity.

In this morning’s epistle, St Paul is filled with this hope. Because we are united to Christ in our baptism we share in both His Death and His Resurrection. While this is a good thing in itself, it also has a purpose:

‘We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.’ (Rom 6:4)

Christians are called to live new lives in Christ. Walking in newness of life means living in a different way. To put it simply, our life and our actions, as well as our words need to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom. If people can see Jesus in us, they will follow Him. Our faith needs to be authentic and lived out daily. This explains why Jesus in the Gospel passage stresses showing and receiving generous hospitality. 

Generous hospitality lies at the heart of this morning’s first reading, from the Second Book of Kings. The Shunammite woman is generous towards the prophet Elisha, and provides him with food and a place to stay. Elisha wants to reward her hospitality: 

And he said, “What then is to be done for her?” Gehazi answered, “Well, she has no son, and her husband is old.” He said, “Call her.” And when he had called her, she stood in the doorway. And he said, “At this season, about this time next year, you shall embrace a son.” And she said, “No, my lord, O man of God; do not lie to your servant.” (2Kings 4:14-16)

God makes the impossible possible, and the woman is blessed with the child she longs for. Likewise in the Gospel, those who are generous are rewarded. Generosity is a hallmark of the Christian community because through it we follow the example of God, who gives His only Son to live and die and rise again for us. It is not surprising, therefore, that in this morning’s Gospel Jesus talks about welcome: hospitality, making people feel at home and comfortable is part of who and what we are as Christians. Today in our Christian Community we show hospitality and generosity to those in need by our collection for the local food-bank. Today’s Gospel highlights some of the many paradoxes of our faith: Jesus can make us feel both spiritually uncomfortable and challenged, and yet, at  the same time, comfortable, loved and accepted. We are loved and challenged by God so that we can live out our faith together, in the knowledge that our reward is secure: it comes from God, and is to be united with God. Thus we can put God before all else, because He is more important. Only God can promise us eternal life in Him. This is surely the greatest possible act of hospitality: to offer to humanity the very thing that our souls long for, the source of our being, our hope and our salvation, bought through Jesus’ Blood on the Cross and freely offered to all who turn to Him.

So, my brothers and sisters in Christ, may we value God above all else. Let us invite others to know Him and love Him, and be united with Him forever, so that we all may sing the praises of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. To whom be ascribed all, glory, dominion, and power, now and forever. Amen.