NOTES for Mat 8:18-22

The evangelist sets apart a group of sayings of Jesus Christ: His brief replies addressed to various people and meant to change their ideas about life at the root. Here are two remarkable examples: the words that "the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head," and about "the dead burying their dead." In the first case, a new disciple, burning with a passionate desire to follow the Teacher through fire and water, suddenly learns that on this path he will have to envy "foxes and birds of the air," and that the fate of the Teacher and His disciples will not at all correspond to his ideas about the life of a renowned and wise person. In the second case, the disciple learns that the distinction between the dead and the living recedes into the background compared with the transformation awaiting Jesus' disciples, so that against their background all the rest turn out to be "dead." But most striking of all is that these two sayings follow one after the other in the Gospel, revealing the contrasts of the Heavenly Kingdom: the despised and humiliated Teacher turns out in reality to be the center of life.

Jesus' words about the dead who should be left to bury their dead can seem too harsh. Yet He is speaking here about the very essence of the new life that entered the world with Him. The situation itself raises questions. It is not very clear whether this concerns a father who has already died and is awaiting burial, or an elderly man whose son is asking permission to live with him so that he will not be left alone in his old age. But in any case one thing is clear: the issue is helping a person live to the end. To die peacefully. To accompany him on his final journey.

In short, it is about everything that, one way or another, is connected with death. But Jesus brought the fullness of life into the world. A fullness the world does not know. What we habitually call life here turns out in reality to be deferred death. Gradual dying. The only question is how far we manage to postpone the end that is inevitable in a fallen world. The Savior offers an alternative to all this: the fullness of life. It can be accepted, but then we will have to leave behind that semblance of life to which we are so accustomed.

To stop dying and begin to live. This is strange, unclear, unfamiliar. More than that: it seems impossible. Even today. Even for Christians. And today in hospitals and hospices Christians help other Christians live out their days. They accompany them on their final journey. And they keep seeking new ways to reconcile these departing Christians with inevitable death, which, for these very Christians, in the normal order of things, simply should not exist.

And if it does exist, if today this problem stands before Christians finishing their earthly path as sharply as it did before Jews in pre-Christian times, and at times even more sharply - not even as for Jews, but as for genuine pagans - then something is wrong with our Christianity. With life and death. With the path. With the Kingdom, not in general, but in our life. If both those who depart and those who remain feel with their whole being that what lies ahead for the departing is not the path of the Kingdom, but death and death alone, then in truth neither the one group nor the other has ever lived the life of the Kingdom. And Jesus directs us precisely toward such a life. This is not maximalism, because only that life deserves the name of life without qualification. And only it is worth living.

Today's reading brings us back once more to the main theme of all four Gospels: the theme of the Kingdom. Before us are two stories: the stilling of the storm (vv. 23-27) and the healing of the possessed, the demon-possessed (vv. 28-34). The events appear very different, since in one case Jesus is dealing with a force of nature, and in the other with people and dark powers. But in essence, in both cases the point is how the Kingdom of God, which Jesus bears in Himself, transforms the world around Him.

To those around Him it appears that He possesses some superhuman abilities or some special powers given Him by God, and that for this reason He can work miracles that no one else can work (v. 27). But in fact the issue is not powers or abilities. The world around Him is being transformed; that is why the storm grows calm and the demons cannot endure it and run away (v. 32). No power, not even the power of God, affects the world in this way: it can, of course, change many things in it, but in this case the point is no longer simply change, but complete transformation, so that the very laws of creation change. According to the laws of the untransformed world, a storm cannot grow calm without a cause. Strictly speaking, in that world it does not grow calm, but in the Kingdom there is no storm; and then everything depends on which reality the person in the midst of the storm becomes a participant in: the reality of the fallen world or the reality of the Kingdom. And here everything is determined only by faith, by trust in the One who brought this Kingdom into the world (v. 26).

But if there is no faith, even manifestations of the Kingdom by themselves will not replace it. This was the case with the Gergesene demoniacs: the manifestation of the Kingdom was plain, and the demons, naturally unable to endure it, felt this very quickly (v. 29). But with the people everything turned out to be less simple. It was hard not to believe the eyewitnesses' story (v. 33), but this story clearly made a paradoxical impression on the local residents: they asked Jesus to leave them in peace (v. 34). And the point was hardly that they felt sorry about the lost herd.

Of course, the inhabitants of those places were pagans and hardly thought much about the Messiah or the Kingdom. But they did understand one thing: Someone had entered their life and had brought in Something with which living as before would become impossible. If He remained among them, their whole life would change radically. And this, evidently, they did not want.

Here Jesus encountered the chief obstacle on His path: people's unwillingness to receive the Kingdom that He offers them. And then He leaves. For if a person refuses the Kingdom, the Savior has nothing more to give him.

Our God, the God of harmony and order, dearly loves what we call the "golden mean" or the "royal path." He, who holds the universe in balance, knows how difficult it is to find balance. And for us, people who do not possess His wisdom and vision, it is practically impossible not to slide into one of the extremes that open before us. This kind of tightrope walking is beyond our strength, especially since we are trying to walk this rope not as saints, leaving everything behind in trust in God, but with all the bundles of our own ideas about what is right and what is not, with all our cultural and other baggage. Perhaps these things are useful in some respects, but on the way to God they only cloud our sight. And then we become very much like the person in today's Gospel reading who approached Jesus second (see Matt. 8:21-22): it is very hard for us to part with what separates us from God.

This call, which appears cruel to many, to leave one's unburied father and follow Jesus, conveys very precisely what the Lord truly wants from us. He proposes that we not cling to this world, but, having weighed everything, renounce temptations and set out on the path toward happiness. Yet this must be done in a measured way, because against one extreme, not daring to follow Christ, there is always another: to run headlong without knowing where, making a mess in the process and deeply wounding those around us. Christ gently checks such an unbridled follower (see Matt. 8:19-20) and calls him to a measured decision.

It turns out that following God requires at the same time both radicalism, the resolve to follow Christ leaving everything behind, and a serious act of will, the utmost collectedness. What remains is to learn to find balance...

It is hardly accidental that Matthew emphasizes that the sick were brought to Christ when evening had come. This can indicate that people were afraid to come in daylight. But it can also testify that all this was taking place on the Sabbath and that people came immediately after the end of the Sabbath rest, without losing a minute.

Let us note that Peter's healed mother-in-law immediately began to serve, and in this way she not only returned to the household concerns familiar to her, but also began to serve Christ in the way familiar to her. We do not meet any further mention of her anywhere, and nowhere is it said that Christ sent her to any special ministry. But one can serve Christ in any place, amid ordinary occupations.

Yet those who want to be near Him He confronts with the reality of difficulties. Jesus warns the scribe who promises to follow Christ wherever He goes about the hardships and about the fact that one should not count on comfort. That answer is understandable. But His answer to another disciple, who wants to bury his father, causes perplexity. Here too, thanks to commentators who know ancient customs, we can understand that the disciple's father is alive, which means the disciple intends to sit at home for years instead of following Christ.

Yet it is impossible to avoid forever the choice of whether to follow Christ or not.

“And Jesus says to him: foxes have dens and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” When we read these words from today’s Gospel reading, we are pierced by a wondrous tenderness for our Lord, by an incomparable compassion and a desire to give Him shelter... But that is impossible: He lived then and there, while we are here and now. Yet this is the divine nature of Jesus, what distinguishes Him from man: right here and now we can give Him shelter—our heart. May each person’s heart become the place where the Lord lays His head. Let us pray in such a way that the Lord comes to us not to labor, but to rest; may He find repose and peace in our heart, for He is very tired.