Last night before bedtime, I read about Jesus sending out the disciples. Before that, I watched a detective show with vampires in Edwardian England. Somehow, in my sleep, vampires and disciples got all muddled up: It was dark. Vampires flowed toward me from across the bridge, wanting to suck my blood. I was about to be emptied of me to become one of them. Then the disciples came from behind me. One of them yanked on my arm to make me come with him. I woke from the dream shaking in the darkness. My right elbow hurt.
I awoke and thought of a question that I had never considered before—what is the difference between becoming a vampire and becoming a disciple?
Some popular piety makes God out to be a bit Dracula-like: as the divine draws us close, all that makes us human is sucked out of us. Our end is to evaporate into the eternal mist. But that, well . . . that is pantheism, and not the end the God of Jesus Christ has in mind for us.
In Christian belief, as God the Creator draws us close, the more real we become. When Jesus calls us to discipleship, the goal isn’t to empty us of our distinctiveness, but for us to become so rich with God’s Spirit that we become the finest human that we can be. We needn’t be afraid of that pull of nearness. The One who tugs us to follow is the One who wants us to flourish.
Jesus sends his disciples out two by two because following him brings great happiness. We rejoice because our names are written in heaven. Whose name is written in heaven? Your name. My name. We are not dissolved into the mist and lost. Our names are written down as one particular human being, created and wanted by God. That is not scary. That is dream-filled delight.
Consider/Discuss
Evangelization efforts throughout history have wrestled with “making people who are more like us.” St. Paul continually battled with the Jewish Christians who wanted the Gentiles to be circumcised before they could be baptized. The early missionaries in the United States strove to make the Native Americans “more European” so they would follow Jesus “better.” The British worked to Anglicize the Indian sub-continent to be “more Christian.” Think about the historical tugging and pulling on people’s arms to make them become “like us.” What would Jesus do? How can we treat other people with respect while still offering them a relationship with the God of holy flourishing?
If you are a cook and bake a delicious new recipe for cinnamon-raisin bread, would you share it? If you are a bird-watcher and you spot a Bohemian waxwing for the first time, would you tell another bird-watcher about it? If you are a football fan and you read about your team’s new five-star quarterback recruit, would you talk about it? You’d be excited! How could you not talk about it? Think about the love and nearness of God, the exhilaration about what Jesus has done to lift us from the muck of life, to redeem us from the pit. Are we excited about that, too? How does sharing our personal story of the God who helps us to flourish differ from arm-twisting and yanking on elbows? How can we effectively witness to that happiness?
Living and Praying with the Word
Good God, thank you that you are not a dark vampire, wanting to suck the life out of me. Quite the contrary—as Isaiah says, you want to nourish me! Your heavenly, sustaining milk is abundant! You fill me with yourself. In the moments when I am close to you, I feel energized, stronger, more alive, more myself. Thank you for carrying me and holding me, as a mother comforts her child. So many people that I know are hungry for your nourishment but do not know you or trust you. Help me, good God of love, to tell the story of your richness, full of enthusiasm and joy!