At the end of an intense teaching about putting him in first place (Lk. 14:26) and carrying ones cross and following him (v.27), Jesus gives two “teaching illustrations” which, on the surface don’t seem very helpful in unpacking the call to discipleship:
“For which of you, wanting to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? Otherwise after he has laid the foundation and is not able to finish it, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish!’ Or what king, going out to engage another king in battle, does not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand. But if not, while the other is still far away, he sends an ambassador and asks for terms of peace. In the same way, therefore, every one of you who does not renounce all his own possessions cannot be my disciple” (v.28-33, LEB).
“What?” One may ask. “What do these two examples have to do with forsaking one’s family to cleave to Christ (v.26) or carrying one’s cross (v.27)? How are they helpful illustrations?”
As I prepared for Sunday’s sermon (which focused almost exclusively on v.26-27) I was struck by a simplicity of the similarity: they’re both examples of people who endeavored to do things they ought not to have done. The man ought not have built the tower and the first king ought not have gone to war against the second. They both began futile projects because they did not reckon on the cost of their resistance to what would make them happy. You want to be happy? Don’t build towers you can’t afford and don’t make enemies of those who you cannot overcome.
Jesus is not saying “Before you follow me make sure you can.” That’s actually not the Gospel. He’s saying “Don’t you see the futility in not being my disciple?” This squares with the preceding sections of Luke 14 which are all about the Great Wedding Banquet parable and about how the Lord longs to have his mansions filled with all those brought in from the byways and rascally places into the glory of the feast, “that my house may be filled” (Lk. 14:15-24).
Jesus then gives us the condition of enjoying the Feast: putting him first, despising all other loves in comparison to our fealty to him and carrying our cross and following him. Against this call of discipleship everything fleshly within us rages “No! Not my mother and father, not my tribe, not my marriage, not my self -these things are more important than Jesus!” Jesus says otherwise. We must make him Lord and set him on the throne of our lives or have none of him. There s no other way.
Both cases in the two examples are pictures of the human soul militated against the call of discipleship: “I will not pick up my cross, I will instead build a tower” and “I will not lay-down all I have, I will instead rage against the King who calls me to do so.”
The building of a tower reminds me of Babel (Gen 11). The raging against the Lord reminds me of Pharoah (Ex. 14-15). Both seek alternatives to blessedness that do not go through the Cross. We build our Babels in a hideous strength forged to contend with Christ. We harness our chariots to march against the fiery God who calls us to humble ourselves before him.
In both cases we see the foolishness of refusing Christ’s invitation to discipleship. Those who refuse the hard sayings of Jesus are like a man who builds a Babel he cannot finish or a suzerain who marches against a good king he cannot vanquish.
What should each man in the parables do? Count the cost. The cost of what? Of resisting Christ. Lay-down your babel projects and yoke with the God of Abraham; lay-down your pharaoh-weapons and sue for peace with the Prince of Peace.