Jacob (A made up name for one of the many un-named followers of Jesus who drifted away in increasing number the closer Jesus led them to Jerusalem) speaks of how hard following Jesus can be.

Some of the things that Jesus says are just so blunt and uncompromising that they’re – well – just plain scary!

Like when he said it is better to drown with a stone round your neck than to cause one of his ‘little ones’ to stumble!

Or when he refused to give even an inch on divorce – calling those who divorce and re-marry ‘adulterers’.   See what I mean?  No compromise there. Some might say, no compassion either.  They’d be wrong, but I know what they mean. Even Moses allowed for divorce in some circumstances – but Jesus blamed that on our hardness of heart.  Ouch!

And then, there’s that time we all got into trouble for refusing to allow the children to come to him.  He said – can you believe it? – that the Kingdom of heaven belongs to them!   More precisely: them and those who become like them!  I mean, who would want to become like a child – worthless, insignificant and expendable?  Not me: I’d never want to be that small and vulnerable ever again! But Jesus said we must or we will never enter his kingdom.  He asks such a lot, don’t you think?

And then there was that rich man – and a good man at that – but Jesus told him to give away everything that he owns! Everything!  How hard is that, I ask you?  Well, ok… we have given up everything to follow him, as Peter said – but that’s the point, you see.  Jesus expects nothing less!  

In his kind of living, everything is turned upside down. Those who are now said to be first will be considered last and those who are now last will come first.  The small a powerless ones ones, women who can be abandoned at whim, the youngest, the poorest, the most vulnerable and most marginalised in society … they come first!  And not only must we be prepared to give to them in magnanimous acts of charity (like that rich man often did, I tell you) he says we must actually become like them – in utter humility, joining them in having nothing left to give!

How can he ask so much? 

But he does, doesn’t he?! 

And now he is making it clear that he not only asks all this of us, he asks it of himself. 

It’s not just idealistic talk; he intends to put it into practice. We are going to Jerusalem and he will be handed over to be mocked and condemned and killed.  That’s what he says will happen. His steely-eyed expression indicates that he means every word of it.  He will sacrifice everything for the sake of the Kingdom.  

That’s why it’s so scary.   He means to live and die like this.  

And, it seems, he means for us to do so, too.