More Than Spectators--July 8, 2025

More Than Spectators--July 8, 2025

"After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go. He said to them, 'The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest'." (Luke 10:1-2)

Turns out there is no option of being merely spectators of Jesus.  He has a way of pulling the crowd of listeners into the action and sending them out to find other listening ears, too.

That is, of course, rather different from the expected protocol of a rock concert or a performance at the symphony.  You don't expect the concertmaster to run out into the sixth row and pull audience members up to add them to the French horn section, and you don't expect the drummer of your favorite band to pull random fans up on stage to take the drum solo of the encore.  We are used to being observers, watchers, and passive audience members.  We know how to clap in the right spots (at the end of the piece but not in between movements!). We know how to hold up lit cell phones the way they used to hold up lighters for the big ballads. We are used to sitting (or standing, depending on the music) and taking it all in without ever being asked to do anything on our part.

And that means we are also used to the posture of control and judgment you get to have when you are just a ticket-holding audience member.  When you have paid money to attend a show, you are the customer--and the customer, as they say, is always right.  You find yourself criticizing the performers: things like "Ooh, those clarinets were FLAT--and they were half a beat late!" or "I don't like this particular staging of Hamlet--why didn't they set it the way I wanted it to be?" or "Why are they playing songs off their new album?  We only came for the greatest hits!"  And you can enjoy that posture of superiority because you know you won't be called up on stage to play a single arpeggio or recite a solitary line in iambic pentameter.  When you are only an audience member, you can stay safe, avoid risk, and not put yourself out there.  And from the perspective of those cushioned seats in the dress circle, you can watch without any effort or exertion.

But, as these verses from Luke's gospel remind us (since many of us heard them this past Sunday), Jesus doesn't leave us as mere spectators. He doesn't draw us into his presence merely to entertain or amuse us, and he isn't bound to playing on the fan favorite greatest hits.  Instead, Jesus calls the people who have been listening to him to join the band and play along--in fact, he sends us out to get new listeners ready for the tune Jesus will sing to them when his tour comes to town. That's what happens with these seventy followers whom Jesus commissions to go to every time and village he planned to visit: they are sent as forerunners and tour promoters, getting new places ready to hear from Jesus... so that they, too, can be drawn into the music and will play along.

This scene is important because in it, we see Jesus widening his circle to include seventy people, not just the more familiar inner circle of twelve disciples.  Maybe if this was only a mission for the twelve--the people who made following Jesus their full time livelihood--we might think that most of us are off the hook for joining the work.  We could tell ourselves, "Well, of course Simon Peter and James and John were sent out to join in Jesus' work--that's what they signed up for when he called them and made them apostles!  They get to be the big names in stained glass, so they have to do the heavy lifting now!"  But this isn't a story about those well-known apostles like Andrew, Thomas, and Philip.  This scene is about seventy "others" whom Jesus apparently chose from the wider circle of the larger crowds who followed and listened to Jesus.  They weren't safe from being summoned by Jesus.  They might have thought they had just come to listen to a traveling rabbi tell some fun stories one day when they had a few hours to spare, but Jesus doesn't see himself as a performer playing to an audience.  He is a coach preparing the starting line-up for the tip off, a conductor warming up the choir for their first anthem, a master teaching the apprentices how to do the work.  Jesus doesn't only call the twelve disciples to be his witnesses and announce the coming of God's Reign--he calls all of us.  

All too often in our culture, we treat Christianity like a professional baseball game: a pastime that we watch for a while, until we get bored or hot or hungry, and which leaves us essentially unchanged.  Jesus, however, reserves the right to make us participants--to toss us a glove and say, "I need you at shortstop.  And you, you'll be up to bat next at the top of the bottom of the inning." We are more than spectators--we are disciples.  Jesus is not particularly interested in our critique of his performance, and he is not only going to do the fan requests (a great many of us would only want to hear Jesus say, "Ask and it will be given to you" or "I have come to give abundant life," but never want to hear the deep cut tracks like, "Sell your possessions and give the proceeds to the poor so you can follow me," or "Love your enemies").  Jesus is training us to join the song, to play with the team, and to share in the work he has already begun.  There is no version of Christianity (at least that has anything to do with the actual Jesus) in which we sit on our hands in passive amusement.  There is only the call of discipleship.

Today, then, what could it look like for us to get up out of our seats and join in what Jesus is doing?  What criticisms might we keep to ourselves? What patterns of passivity might we leave back in our padded seats in order to pick up and instrument and play?  What risks might Jesus dare us to take, and what people might he send us to spend time with?  And what if Sunday mornings weren't pastimes to while away an hour or so until lunch time, but the conversation with the coach before we run the next play?

What if we were more than spectators... starting today?

Lord Jesus, call us up from our comfortable positions, and make of us what you will.