Today’s readings are about choices. What choices will we make in life? How we will think about one another, and act towards each other and what we will hold fast to as the guiding principles or foundations of our lives.

In the Old Testament reading – these choices are diametrically opposed – choose life and prosperity by following God’s way of love, or death and adversity by turning our backs on God. Choose life, so that you and your descendants may live. All of us want to do this of course – to choose life, for ourselves and for those we love.

As Christians though we are called to go beyond our own immediate family and seek a way of living that brings life for all.

Now we know that living in this way is challenging enough, but in today’s Gospel, Jesus lays out what is required to follow him as a disciple – and its unbelievably tough.

I was thinking about this yesterday while I was at a football match with some of my family. It was my dad’s birthday, and luckily his treat came good – as Norwich beat Coventry 3-0! You’re not always guaranteed a win at Carrow Road any more than at the POSH, but so far so good – this season down in the Championship is going very well!

The thing is, that going to the footy certainly makes you feel like part of a family – the shared passion for a particular team binds you together with those around you who are wearing the same colour shirts! This happy family feel doesn’t extend of course to the opposing team – quite the reverse! Early on in the game yesterday, Norwich were 1-0 up and then Coventry scored – for a moment the small section of the crowd in pale blue shirts went wild – and everyone in yellow shirts cannot help but see them as the enemy. Luckily for the Canaries, it was offside and the goal was disallowed.

Now we know that in football, as in other sports, good preparation is the name of the game, and defeat can be very costly indeed.

When Jesus is talking about building towers and going out to wage war, he points out that no-one with any common sense at all would do those things without adequate preparation and weighing up the cost.

But there is another meaning to being prepared.

A team cannot go all out to win without being prepared to concede a goal, or even lose the match.

And we cannot live life at all fully without being prepared to make mistakes or risk being hurt.

To live fully is to love, and to love is to open ourselves to all kinds of vulnerabilities – most especially the pain of losing someone we love so dearly.

But when Jesus speaks to his disciples about the cost of following him, it sounds to our ears impossible and unacceptable. How could we hate our family, and even life itself? We do know of course that the Christian life is often costly – carrying the cross and walking in the way of Jesus does demand much of us.

But we need to remember that Jesus is speaking in this passage to those who will be his closest disciples – who in order to follow him in his ministry – did indeed leave behind homes, families, livelihoods – and then through being so closely associated with Jesus and carrying on his work – became apostles and then martyrs for the faith.

This is not everyone’s calling – we are not all called to this form of radical discipleship – although some still are today.

But for most of us, there is still a degree of being prepared to let go of things, to live light to the ways of the world in order to follow our call to live as Christians – living together as the family of God, the Body of Christ.

Loving our own family as we do, we are also called to love one another – our brothers and sisters in Christ, our mothers, fathers, children in Christ – in a new way, because we are all one in Jesus as he is one with God. It is a new identity and a new relationship with each other – with everyone.

We see this made clear in Paul’s very clever and subtle letter to Philemon. Paul is putting the case for Philemon’s runaway slave, Onesimus. Whatever Onesimus has done wrong, he is so desperate that he has come to ask for Paul’s help, even though Paul is in prison and surely has limited powers to help in any practical way.

Paul writes to his friend Philemon, in a letter that will be read out publicly, and makes it clear what Philemon must do. In the new world that Jesus has brought into being there are no distinctions anymore, no slaves or free, Jew or Greek etc etc – we are to see each other as one family, all equal and all equally loved in God’s eyes.

This is something we have to consciously choose to do, because the world in Paul’s day, and still in our own, thrives on keeping us all too aware of those distinctions and differences. Paul, is telling Philemon that he should accept Onesimus back, in Christian love, not to be punished as a slave but welcomed as an equal and loved like a brother.

The challenge here is to a different kind of radical discipleship – that of unlimited love.

If in order to build a tower – you must prepare and plan, to make sure that you can carry out your aim then, just as much, to live a life of love as a disciple of Jesus also requires good preparation.

One way we prepare ourselves is through prayer – living a life based on a rhythm of prayer that enables us to be fed in faith and grow in love. To learn to listen more and more to the heartbeat of God so that we might hear his call, and proclaim his kingdom.

And so over these next few weeks, as the year turns into autumn and we give thanks for the glory of creation and seek to know more of the Creator – we are all invited to join together in an adventure in prayer, both in church and at home, out in the community and while at work – as we draw closer together as the family of God and as we discover what he is calling us to do in his name in our City.

As with all adventures – you never quite know how they will turn out – that is part of the excitement and the cost! The adventure for a certain green and yellow football team this season, may be promotion back to the Premiership – though there is huge cost and risk in that!

At certain times and seasons of all our lives, there are moments of opportunity and new possibilities. What will be our adventure in discipleship over these next few years…….well that is something to look forward to!

Amen.

Sermon: Reverend Michelle Dalliston. 4th September 2022. (St John The Baptist Church Peterborough UK)

Referenced Scripture: Deuteronomy 30:15-end, Philemon 1:1-21, Luke 14:25-33