NOTES for Luk 9:44-50

The apostles ask Jesus one of those questions whose answer was meant to flatter their pride. They evidently considered themselves special, “advanced,” particularly close to the Teacher, and therefore more important than other people. But Jesus’ answer proves completely unexpected, overturning all their assumptions and reducing every kind of vanity to nothing. It turns out that on the divine scale, what the world regards as small becomes great and what it regards as unimportant becomes important. The disciples looked for the answer among adults like themselves, people made wise by experience, whereas they simply needed to look at something entirely different. To enter the Kingdom of Heaven, it is useless to develop to the utmost those qualities that society values. Christ calls us to be “born from above,” becoming altogether different. It is astonishing that the image closest to us, showing what such a new person should be, is a helpless child who can simply be “taken and placed before Him.”

We have to travel quite a long road before arriving at the simple thought that whoever is not against us is for us. It is easier to look for enemies than to live among fellow fighters and fellow workers. It is more pleasant to consider oneself the final authority on truth than to acknowledge oneself as one among many. It takes a long time to digest the knowledge that you are not the first but the last among those whom the Lord has called. Along this road we are always trying to turn away from “whoever is not against you is for you” toward “whoever is not with Me is against Me.” We try to equate ourselves with the Lord and take the place of the first and best disciple, the one who has understood everything and will immediately reorganize the world according to their own understanding. It is precisely from this that the Lord protects us when He sets before us a child's, an infant's attitude toward hierarchy, authority, career advancement, our place in the world, and, ultimately, toward what we know at all about Him and about ourselves.

The Savior's words that those who are not against Christians are thereby "for" them can at first glance seem somewhat strange. In fact, there are plenty of people in the world who have nothing against Christ and even against Christianity, but who also have nothing, in general, "for" them. They are simply indifferent to all this, either remaining agnostics or choosing for themselves other spiritual traditions and spiritual paths.

Can such a position be called a position "for" Christ or "for" Christianity? If Christianity is viewed as some new religion, then, of course, the answer can only be negative. Every religion needs supporters, preferably conscious, active, and convinced of their rightness, people who could spread this religion and testify to its truth.

But Christianity is not a new religion; it is a new life. Life with Christ in His Kingdom, which He brought into the world. And with life everything is not as simple as with views and convictions, whether political, social, scientific, or even religious. One can become a supporter of certain views or convictions only when one understands and accepts them to the end.

Of course, every religion has among its supporters those who do not especially understand not only its theological subtleties, but sometimes even the subtleties of its doctrine; however, even such adherents who understand little of the subtleties express their support for their religion quite consciously and unequivocally, and sometimes even more decisively than everyone else. But with life everything is not so simple. People often live their whole life, or most of it, without thinking at all about how, by what, and why they live.

The same is true of the life of the Kingdom, which now, according to the Savior's word, has drawn near. A person can sometimes feel the movement of the breath of the Kingdom without really understanding what is happening to him and what he is dealing with. After Christ's coming this happens often, because the Kingdom has drawn near to everyone, not only to Christians. It is an objective spiritual reality, not a spiritual experience belonging to some particular confession or, even more, monopolized by it.

Today anyone can feel the breath of the Kingdom, provided, of course, that he does not reject in advance everything connected with Christ and Christianity. In that case it turns out that a person who appears to have no relation to Christianity can turn out to be "for" Christ and "for" Christians, provided, of course, that he takes his experience and his life seriously.

Of course, such "anonymous" Christianity does not yet guarantee that a person will consciously set out on the Christian path, but he will not become an enemy of Christ and Christians either. This means that the way into the Kingdom will be open for such a person, and the possibility of walking this way can remain for him long enough, as long as the One who brought the Kingdom into the world wishes.

These words are addressed not only to those who are just setting out to follow Jesus, but also to the disciples themselves—and to us. Does the thought never “occur” to us as to which of us is the greatest? Or do we never feel the urge to “forbid” someone who thinks differently? Or to ask God to send fire from heaven upon our enemies, “as Elijah did”? Do we always know what spirit we are of? Many of us have not only “put a hand to the plough,” but have already ploughed half the field. And yet are we looking back again?

As can be seen, Jesus keeps explaining to His disciples, through different examples, what the life of the Kingdom is and what it is like. And the Evangelist gathers these examples together, making a kind of digest that contains short descriptions of them. Here are the disciples arguing over who is the greatest in the Kingdom. Well, after the Teacher, of course. Here are the same disciples eager to call thunder down on a Samaritan village where they are not received. Not for their own sake, of course, but for the Teacher's sake. And for the truth, naturally.

And here are people they meet along the road. One is ready to go, but Jesus tells him: I have nowhere to invite you. To another Jesus Himself says: Follow Me, and that man asks permission to bury his father, and receives an answer that sounds merciless. As does another one: the answer is softer outwardly, but in substance it says: leave it, forget everyone, or else you will have to forget the Kingdom.

What is this: a particular kind of selectiveness? Yes, of course: Jesus sees every person's heart; it is as transparent to Him as it is to His heavenly Father. But there is also something common here. The Kingdom is open to everyone. But on one condition: it must be first in the life of the one who wants to reach it. In the Kingdom people do not live out their remaining days; they live. And those who refuse to go, in one way or another, want to live out what remains. To stay with those who are living out what remains. They do not understand that one can go on living out what remains, alone or with others, endlessly. In the fallen world there is no real life; here there are only its remnants. And one has to choose: either gather up these remnants and try to squeeze the last out of them, or go where there is life in abundance. Without trying to drag along the remains of that imitation of life that can be found in the fallen world.

But there, in the Kingdom, the laws are different. There are no bosses and subordinates there; there are ministries that must be carried, and whoever knows how to do this better is the greatest. The one who is greatest in the Kingdom does not receive the best places, but the more responsible ministries. And there is no need there to prove anything to anyone. In this world too, the Kingdom does not need to be proved to anyone.

It can be shown, of course. But proving it is pointless. For proof, especially with heavenly thunder involved, always presupposes a desire to persuade by force. To make someone accept, to make someone believe. And then it no longer matters what the irresistible arguments will be: in any case they presuppose that a person yields before the inevitable, whether it is a force from which there is no escape or an obviousness that cannot be evaded. The Kingdom, of course, is both force and obviousness. But it is a force one can walk away from, and an obviousness one can choose not to notice. God does not impose Himself, and the person is free. To the free, freedom; to the saved, paradise.

Today's reading is entirely devoted to the theme of the Kingdom and to how the people around Jesus understood it, including His closest disciples. And once again we encounter a complete failure, even on the apostles' part, to understand what the Kingdom is and what its laws are. The very question of primacy, of who is greatest in the Kingdom (v. 46), loses all meaning there. Jesus was able to explain this by pointing the disciples to a child, whom the problem of primacy, because of age, does not yet concern at all (vv. 47-48).

According to the laws of our world, still not transformed, the great person is the one who is great by his own greatness; in the Kingdom, as it appears, one's own greatness means nothing, and the less a person relies on it, the more the greatness of the Kingdom shines through him. That is why there is no need to impose this Kingdom by force, as the apostles thought of doing in one Samaritan village where Jews, as usual, were not welcome (vv. 51-54): in that way one can only demonstrate one's own force and prove one's own importance, but it is impossible to bring people closer to the Kingdom by such a method. It is no accident that Jesus tells the disciples that they are not acting in the spirit of the Kingdom: for the Kingdom, any violence is unacceptable; no one can be driven there by force, because to enter it one needs above all a relationship with God and with the One whom He sends, and that relationship must not be imposed but freely accepted.

A Kingdom imposed by force is not the Kingdom, but only its phantom, which can destroy a person but cannot save him. And since the Kingdom is not a place but a relationship, it is not limited by any structure. Even the apostolic community does not limit it, if one looks at that community not as a fellowship of people living in the Kingdom, but as a kind of organization for promoting the idea of the Kingdom of God. That is why everyone who bears witness to it in Christ's name, revealing to those around him its power and effectiveness, finds his own place in it, even if formally he has no relation to the apostolic community (vv. 49-50). Thus, dispelling the myths of mass religious consciousness that were so widespread in those days, Jesus strengthens in the hearts of His disciples those ideas about the Kingdom that must help them live through His death on the cross and receive His resurrection.

Today we read a small selection of short accounts about Jesus, assembled by the evangelist to show how extraordinary His Message is and how incompatible it is with normal human ideas. In the coming Kingdom of God, everything will be different from what is customary on earth: the most important and respected will be those who are least valued in human eyes (for children had no rights before reaching adulthood and were regarded as their parents' property, like slaves, yet Jesus holds them up as an example to the disciples). Jesus forbids His disciples to divide people into “ours” and “not ours,” although this is a fundamental principle of human society (for comparison, watch the news on television). His Kingdom lies outside our system of values and proves more important even than the sacred duty to bury one's father, more important than a comfortable home and family. It takes hold of a person entirely—the one who asked Jesus about His Kingdom has already “put his hand to the plow,” already begun the paradoxical path toward God...

It is striking that Christ's disciples, until His very Resurrection from the dead, are held captive by common Jewish ideas. Faced with the Samaritans' refusal to receive Him, they are already ready to pray for fire from heaven and cite the prophet Elijah as an example to imitate.

It must be admitted that for many Christians over the centuries such a form of preaching appeared optimal. In one empire, a special theological theory was even devised according to which the emperor had to be converted to Christianity, and then by fire and sword he would conquer the whole world and drive all subject peoples into the faith. Everything would have been fine; it is only a pity that the empire fell before it managed to fulfill the mission laid upon it.

Christ's words in response to this strange thought of the disciples are simple and stern: "You do not know what spirit you are of". Though empires nowadays seem to have disappeared (perhaps fortunately), this temptation, and this rebuke by Christ of our inclination to violence, remain very important in the lives of individual people as well. It is not fitting to defend truth by force, because Truth conquers on the Cross.

Soon after Peter's confession, as we can see, Jesus showed the closest of His disciples visibly what the Kingdom is and what human nature becomes in it. In church usage this event received the name Transfiguration. As the Savior appeared before the disciples on the day of the Transfiguration, so every person becomes in the Kingdom, if he can contain its life in all the fullness available to him. The fullness of the life of the Kingdom transforms every human nature, but for that to happen, the nature being transformed must be freed from the power of evil and sin, just as the Savior's human nature was free from it. And then, immediately after the scene of the visible manifestation of the Kingdom, another scene follows: the scene of no less visible a triumph in this world of the evil in which it lies.

Indeed, one can hardly find a brighter example of triumphant evil than possession, where the power of darkness manifests itself almost openly, as though challenging everything bright that exists in the world. And the disciples, who have just seen the triumphant Kingdom entering the world, can set nothing against this evil. They are unable to help the possessed man. This is no surprise: the Kingdom is still only on the threshold; the process of its entering the world, in essence, has not even begun yet, while all its fullness is concentrated entirely in the person of the Savior.

The Kingdom is not of this world, and it will remain outside the world until Jesus completes His earthly path. It is no accident that after all these events Jesus returns again to the theme of His earthly path and His death on the cross. Again and again He repeats: the Kingdom is not at all what most people imagine it to be. It will not become a triumphant earthly power. Evil cannot be defeated by external force; within the fallen world it is indeed invincible. The Kingdom of God is impossible in principle as a kingdom of this world.

The Messiah cannot be a triumphant victor not because God lacks the strength to drive evil out of the world and defeat it, but because, if He acted that way, the world would disappear together with the evil in which it lies. In this sense, the salvation that Jesus brought into the world most closely resembles an operation to free hostages, which is what we all are. Such an operation can be carried out only at the cost of the death of the One who brought the Kingdom into the world, at the cost of His death on the cross. It is an infinitely hard path, but there is no other.

Today's reading includes two events that, at first glance, are connected only chronologically: the Transfiguration (vv. 28-36) and the healing of the possessed son of an unnamed man (vv. 38-45). And yet the Evangelist does not connect these two stories by accident. It would seem that, against the background of what had just happened, another healing, even one unsuccessful for the apostles, was an ordinary enough event that one might not even mention it.

Meanwhile Jesus' reaction to it was unusually harsh (v. 41). Commentators, of course, have still not come to a single opinion about whom Jesus' words primarily concern: the man who brought his son to Him, or the apostles. But against this background an important detail is the mention that, precisely after the unsuccessful healing, Jesus again and again reminds His disciples of His suffering and death (vv. 43-44), while they cannot understand Him at all: something hides from the apostles the meaning of what the Savior has said (v. 45). It is especially noteworthy that they were even afraid to ask the Teacher again. Until then He had never left their questions unanswered, and not once had He become angry at any question; what, then, could the disciples have been afraid of?

Of course, it was frightening to hear about the Teacher's death from His own lips, but the apostles were not children or cowards ready to hide their heads in the sand at the sight of danger. Apparently they did not simply fail to understand; rather, they did not accept Jesus' words, hoping that they were only a slip, a misunderstanding, or some image, a parable whose meaning would in time be explained. For on the day of the Transfiguration the apostles saw the Kingdom already in all its fullness; one could say that they came home to their Teacher, who had invited them to Himself in order to show them His true home. And there, on that day of triumph, He suddenly begins to speak to them about His death, which for them could only be defeat and catastrophe.

Such a thing, of course, could not fit into their consciousness: for the resurrection, in which the apostles of course believed, was still something too distant for them to become real within their own lives. And so they still did not trust Jesus to the end. But distrust destroys relationships, and when the moment of healing came, the moment of witness to the Kingdom, the apostles failed. Seeing this distrust, which had gone so far, Jesus may well have judged the situation with utmost severity. And no wonder: for the unreadiness mentioned here by the Evangelist to accept Jesus' words about His death and resurrection would later become the cause both of Peter's denial and of Judas' betrayal.

The parallels between the Transfiguration of Jesus Christ and the accounts of Moses and Elijah going up the mountain were clear to the first readers of Luke's Gospel. On the mountaintop, both prophets heard the supreme revelation—the foundation of the message they brought to Israel (Exodus 19; 1 Kings 19). Now the apostles find themselves in their place: together with the prophets of old, they stand before the Source of revelation and, like them, hear the Father's voice from the cloud of light. This testimony is the foundation of the Gospel that they are to proclaim to the whole world: “This is My beloved Son; I delight in Him!” As in centuries past, what matters most is revealed not in theological formulas or as a secret doctrine, but in these words of Light concerning Light.