Please read the passage before the homily.
Are you willing to follow Jesus wherever he goes? This is a trick question, or you might call it a leading question, “wherever Jesus leads you.”
Consider that Jesus had no place to lay his head; he was homeless. He also told us not to stay around until we bury our parents. He wants us to plow ahead, without looking back.
I know that if you drive your car and keep looking back, you will wreck your can and may end up in the hospital or cemetery. If you follow a homeless person, you will probably miss your family. On the other hand, if you wait until your previous generation dies off, you will probably find that you have missed the Lord.
There is one main point in all three episodes. The Lord demands total commitment. You may have no place to stay, no meal to eat, no family left, but you have the one Lord and God of all who can reimburse you beyond your greatest expectations.
Be assured of this, however, that you cannot desert your family to follow the Lord. If you have a spouse and family, your job and calling is to nurture your family. You cannot forsake your noisy home and kids for the quiet of a monastery or convent. This will not work. The noisy house has its own holiness which is different from the holiness of a monastery. You have to follow the Lord into your noisy house if that is where you have to follow Christ. The homeless Christ finds shelter where you live and where he invites you to take him in.
Into your home with its aging parents or sick or noisy children, there homeless Christ will find a place to lay his head and you will find rest for yourself. That is also where you will die to yourself and bury your deadness in the life of Christ.
Into your home, when you follow Christ there, you will move forward without looking back even when it seems that you are spinning your wheels.
Today the Lord days, “Follow me”. How do we respond?