Jesus Turns to Jerusalem

Jerusalem and the imminent exodus of cross and resurrection will neither be delayed nor conditioned

photo of a fox in its den
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March 5, 2025

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Commentary on Luke 9:51-62



On more ordinary kinds of journeys, with parents at the wheel and children in the back seat, we might hear the question: “How much longer until we’re there?” In answer, we might say something vague: “Not much longer.” Maybe this “when the days drew near” (verse 51) feels like Luke’s “not much longer”—as in, the time when Jesus was about “to be taken up” was just around the bend.

The “taken up” language recalls Jesus’ imminent “exodus” (“departure,” New Revised Standard Version) in verse 31 of the transfiguration account—Jesus turns to Jerusalem where this exodus, shorthand for cross and resurrection, will be accomplished. This is The Destination of Destinations, after which everything else is mere commentary.

As in the past, Luke situates the reader with a geographical note, but it also serves as an introduction to material unique to Luke, including the parables of the good Samaritan (10:25–37), lost coin (15:8–10), dishonest manager (16:1–13), and others. By comparison, Mark reports a compact journey to Jerusalem, with the transfiguration at 9:2–8 and Jesus’ triumphal entry at 11:1–11. Luke will not show Jesus entering Jerusalem until 19:28. All this suggests that, for Luke, these are not “rest stops” but richly textured narratives that offer clues about where this story of Jesus is going and what “exodus” means for disciples.

Luke uses the suspense of the imminent return to Jerusalem as a foil for the further development of Jesus’ identity as Lord and, by implication, the life of the disciple through the parables, sayings, and controversies unique to Luke. A travelogue is a convenient way to “pass the time”; however, it is not without problems.

Luke’s travelogue, if it is a travelogue, leaves some scratching their heads, particularly because the references to villages are few and vague, and because the progress to a destination seems contradictory, especially when, after eight chapters of travel, readers discover that Jesus and the disciples are somewhere “between Samaria and Galilee” (17:11)—presumably not far from the village of Samaria in 9:52!

In this text, one detects Luke’s way of unfolding the peculiar “charge” that the disciples live under. You might also say that this text is a showcase of how disciples, being disciples, can get it wrong.

When Jesus sends the disciples to a village in Samaria, opposition would have been predictable, given their history. Jesus nevertheless chooses opposition rather than welcome. But even more important, Jesus chooses a different path from the one that seems most natural to the disciples: They want to bring down fire from heaven onto the Samaritans (an allusion to Elijah doing thus to his enemies), but Jesus, one reminiscent of Elijah but infinitely more radical, does not come with the fire of judgment but with the power of healing. This, and not a scorched-earth policy, will be the mark of Jesus’ journey.

In the second portion of the text, we hear the account of three “failed” disciples:

  • The first says, “I will follow you,” but is told that for the disciple there is no place they will recognize as a home. Foxes have dens, birds have nests—but the one who follows Jesus will in some way create home where there was no home to speak of (verses 57–58).
  • The second says, “I will follow you, only let me bury my father.” Jesus responds, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God” (verse 60), reorienting the would-be disciple to the decisive call to bear witness to resurrection community in a death-dealing world.
  • The final disciple says, “But let me say goodbye to my family before I join you,” and it feels similar to the second one: The forward movement of this calling comes without qualification or condition—Jerusalem and the imminent exodus of cross and resurrection will neither be delayed nor conditioned.

Reflection

Luke’s account of Jesus’ journey, without rest and yet anticipating a different kind of rest, feels at once familiar and unfamiliar. It almost brings to mind the security check lines in airports, which compress our forward journey into the maze-like path where we spend most of our time with our destination in our peripheral vision (perhaps anticipating the hazing we will undergo as we pass through security) and our reality dominated by the often-sluggish way forward. If I could see it from above, I wonder if it would look like a snake that had just swallowed its prey, with the lump of its memory (bags and people) stalled in its body, only to move forward again before balling up in the snake’s digestive process.

One might be tempted to see Luke’s seeming failure to make it much farther than “somewhere between Samaria and Galilee” in 17:11 as indicative of this kind of journey. While this detail may reflect some sloppy cut-and-paste on Luke’s part (the narrator might have “cleaned” up the story so there was “natural” progress to the destination), it does speak to a time when many of us feel a longing for “arrival” but live in a reality where arrivals are constantly delayed or even canceled.

However, this is where Luke’s narrative is anything but delayed and certainly not canceled—the narratives are not merely “peripheral” glimpses of our destination but moments when we glimpse an in-breaking of the welcome we have desired but not known.

James K. A. Smith’s On the Road with Saint Augustine offers a rich meditation on the life of one who is seemingly ever on the road, a kind of metaphor for 21st-century spirituality. However, the way of Jesus offers a different sort of road, namely what Smith calls a “refugee spirituality: unsettled yet hopeful, tenuous but searching, eager to find the hometown we’ve never been to.”1

Contemporary ideas that the road is life or that we live in a Sisyphus-like world, pushing a stone up to the top of the hill only to have it roll back down again, are not representative of the path of Jesus. Although this text from Luke does not fill out what home looks like, Jesus’ sayings and actions make it clear that this, to paraphrase Smith, is a home where we’ve never been—it promises the unlikely welcome for the weary traveler, the prodigal child, and the migrant community.


Notes

  1. James K. A. Smith, On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2019), 50.

PRAYER OF THE DAY

Lord Jesus, Great Teacher,
You place tremendous responsibility upon those who follow you. You demand more than we are often willing to give. You promise no safety, only that the way will be rough. Make us ready and willing to walk your rocky path and carry your subversive word to hostile ears, for the hope and promise of rewarding life in Jesus Christ. Amen.

HYMNS

Savior, when in dust to you ELW 601
Savior, when in tears and dust NCH 185
The glory of these forty days ELW 320, H82 143
Abide with me ELW 629, H82 662, UMH 700, NCH 99

CHORAL

Hide not thou thy face, Richard Farrant