"Then [Jesus and his disciples] arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee." (Luke 8:26)
At first blush, this verse that begins the Gospel reading many of us heard on Sunday seems like just a bit of dull geography. "Jesus and his disciples go to such and such a region." Nobody memorizes a verse like that or underlines it in their Bible, and I have never seen it embroidered on a wall hanging or made into a decorative plaque to mount on their living room wall. And yet, there's a lot going on in this single verse, and it has serious implications for how we live our lives as disciples, too.
Let's start with the most basic: Jesus brings his disciples along with him, just about everywhere he goes. That is to say, being Jesus' disciple is different from being an observer of a performance or a fan watching a game. Observers don't have to do the difficult stuff. Fans don't have to even break a sweat. But disciples go where the rabbi goes... in order to do what the rabbi does. I'm reminded of the old line of Kierkegaard's that Jesus isn't looking for admirers, since an admirer can decide at any point not to follow in the teacher's footsteps. Jesus calls people to join in his work, share his journey, and go to the places he goes, whether or not that is comfortable for us at the time.
That's worth remembering every time we slide back into thinking that following Jesus is just a hobby, like "playing church," that we can set aside for a while or bow out from when it gets risky or costly. Sometimes we treat this faith of ours like a Sunday-morning pastime, interchangeable with doing the crossword puzzle in the newspaper, going golfing, or picking up with your favorite soap opera. But Jesus calls us to go along with him where he goes--even if we don't know the destination ahead of time when we step on the board or hit the road. He calls us to trust him, and to trust that he knows where he is going, without getting our permission first for where he intends to take us.
And that, of course, raises a second point--just where precisely do we think that Jesus is going to lead us? Because it's not likely to be just a matter of gentle loops around the block in our own familiar neighborhood or comfort zones. Jesus has a way of crossing boundaries. That's also here in this single sentence from Luke's gospel: Jesus and his disciples get in a boat and cross to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, which puts them solidly in Gentile territory. They land in "the country of the Gerasenes," which is definitely not familiar turf for Jesus' Jewish disciples. (It will become even clearer later in this story that they are in Gentile/non-Jewish territory when there is a herd of pigs nearby, since swine are unclean animals in the Jewish law.) So Jesus takes his disciples across the border into non-Jewish territory, which forces both him and his students into the role of outsiders. They are the foreigners now. They are the migrants who have crossed the boundary into another country. They are the ones going into the midst of people who might well view them with suspicion as people with the "wrong" religion, culture, language, and way of life. Jesus and his disciples are the odd ones out here, running the risk of being rejected or run out of town if things go sour. Jesus and his disciples, then, are the ones who make themselves vulnerable and take the chance of being mistreated as "foreigners." They don't merely stay on their own side of the Sea of Galilee where no Gentiles will cross their paths. Jesus' community of followers go where Jesus goes, which includes going into potentially hostile places. Before anything else happens in this scene, it is worth remembering this much: being Jesus' disciple will mean we are not only going to be surrounded with other people "like" us, because Jesus deliberately leads his disciples across borders and borders where we are seen as the outsiders. That's part of what it means to be his follower.
On this day, then, the question to ask is, Where might Jesus be leading me... or us, today? It's unlikely he will only call us to stay in our comfort zones, and it's almost certain he will not leave us where we started. We may be sent to get to know people with different languages, skin colors, cultures, customs, and ways of living. We may be sent with Jesus to meet people who look different, love differently, and learn in different ways. We may be sent to put ourselves in positions where we become the vulnerable and marginalized ones, rather than being in control and comfortable. But it will be worth it because we will be where Jesus is leading us, and we will be where he is.
And wherever Jesus is, even if we don't know the destination while we're on the journey, is the right place for us to be.
Lord Jesus, give us the courage to follow where you lead us, even across boundaries we thought were uncrossable.
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