Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God. Luke 9:60
Some have suggested that Jesus gave a cold and unfair response to the man who offered to follow him after he had buried his father. They say Jesus was putting His own agenda before compassion toward someone who was grieving the loss of a close family member. Jesus had asked the man to follow Him and the man had responded by saying that he had something that was more important at the moment: the burial of his father. What is not apparent from the text is that the man’s father was still alive, and that the man was just making an excuse for not following Jesus. So Jesus in our text is simply pointing out to the man that he had his priorities wrong.
How do we know that the man’s father was not dead? By the fact that this man was out in public. Jewish custom was that when a parent had died, family members went into mourning and remained inside the home for at least a month. What the man was saying was that he would follow Jesus after his father had died. Perhaps he was concerned about taking over his father’s property and financial affairs. Perhaps he wanted to spend time with his father in his declining days. But it is obvious that family affairs were much more important to him than being a follower of Jesus. So the Lord Jesus pointed out to him the reality of having his priorities straight.
Jesus’ response gives two alternatives: burying the dead and preaching the kingdom. To put it another way, the alternatives were to be taken up with the things of death or to be proclaiming the way of life. The first alternative is the world’s occupation. People who are spiritually dead are occupied with that which is dying and which will be burned up in the judgment someday. To be so occupied is to miss that which is eternal, that which really matters. The other alternative is to place the dead things of this world in their place, and be occupied with the kingdom of God. The man was instructed to preach the kingdom of God, so he must have had ability as a speaker. If he had other abilities, the Lord would have instructed him to use those. But he would be promoting the things of God, that which will endure long after the dead of this world are long gone and forgotten.
Jesus’ message to the reluctant follower is directed to us today. We must leave the world to deal with its own matters while we take up the cause of our Lord. The necessary affairs of the world should never take precedence over the affairs of the One Who we call our Lord. And neither should the unnecessary affairs of the world. But they do. -Jim MacIntosh