Reading Luke 9:51-54: On Not Destroying People Who Disagree with You

In Luke 9:51-54, Jesus is going about teaching, and he sends messengers to a Samaritan village to announce that He is coming there to teach, too.  Jesus finds out that the village does not want him to come.  His apostles James and John ask Jesus if they should ‘command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did’.  Jesus says no, and tells James and John that they do not know ‘what manner of spirit ye are of’ – basically, in asking whether they should destroy this village for rejecting Jesus, they don’t know what they are asking.  Then Jesus says ‘For the Son of Man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them’.  This is so important:  Jesus did not come to destroy people, He came to save people. 

This reminds me of the scripture in John 12:47, where Jesus says ‘And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not:  for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.’  In both of these passages, you have Jesus referring to people who either will not hear Him or will not believe Him.  And, please note, He does not destroy them.  Furthermore, He does not even judge them, or ‘condemn’ would also work here.  What does it mean to preach, but not to condemn?  Is it that you speak truth, pursue truth, but you do not pronounce condemnations on people who disagree with you?  Would a judgment be to ‘classify’ them as either an enemy or a friend?  Is Jesus saying that He came to preach, but not to ‘classify’ His hearers? Is this a ‘keeping the door open as long as possible’ policy?

At any rate, Jesus lets those who reject Him go their way.  He does not pursue them, harass them, or reject them when they come back to ask Him more questions.  But Jesus Himself keeps going about His Father’s business – teaching, blessing, healing, calling to repentance, and speaking with grace so that His words invite and uplift, rather than exclude and demean.

There are two more scriptures to bring in here, I think.  First, from Luke 4:22: ‘And all bare him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth.’  I love this.  The word grace here means kindness, and also refers to ‘God freely extending Himself, reaching to people because He is disposed to bless, or be near them’.  So when people listened to Jesus, they were amazed at His kindness, His reaching out so freely to them.  They sensed that Jesus wanted to be near them – this seems to mean that Jesus did not reach out with hostility, judgment or moral superiority, but in truth and in love.

So, to read these passages together in applying them to us:  like Jesus, we should be free with our kind speech; we should let grace proceed out of our mouths.  Jesus says He does not judge if we do not ‘keep’ or ‘watch’ his words, but He does keep speaking to whomever will listen.  Free with grace, free with truth, and long on forbearance, eating at the table with sinners/those with whom we strongly disagree as much as we can.  And maybe these things together will help us to stay away from the darkness.

And one more point:  James and John wanted to destroy those who would not hear Jesus.  Earlier in Luke 9:37-42, we read that Jesus’s disciples could not heal a child possessed by an evil spirit.  The child would cry, foam at the mouth, and hurt himself.  The father was distraught, and asked Jesus to try to cast out the spirit, because the disciples had been unsuccessful.  I wonder if there is a connection here – the tendency to want to engage in destruction rather than edification might also reduce our power to bring good things into people’s lives.  In this age when destruction is all about us, I think we need to be very intentional, very aware, of building people up.