• Wisdom 9:13-18
• Psalm 90: 3-6, 12-14, 17
• Philemon 9-10, 12-17
• Luke 14:25-33

God is different, and that means that we who wish to be disciples must also be different. This is what our readings for next Sunday seem to be telling us. The first reading is from a portion of the Book of Wisdom that places a prayer on the lips of King Solomon. Here he is explaining why he asked above all for the gift of wisdom; because God is different, “what human being will know God’s plan?” He is well aware of the human plight: “the mortal body weighs down the soul, and the earthy tent weighs down the mind with all its thoughts”. We find, he argues, things on earth hard to guess at – “and whoever tracked down things in heaven?” The only way we can know God’s plan is “if you give wisdom, and send your Holy Spirit”. Only God can give the gift, “and so the paths of those on earth were made straight, and human beings were taught what pleases you, and were saved by Wisdom”. This precious gift of Wisdom acts as a bridge between God and ourselves.

The psalm is likewise aware of the distance between God and human beings, and with a touch of sadness addresses this God, “You turn a man back into dust; and you will say, ‘Go back, sons of men’.” Another way of expressing it has to do with the contrast between our time-bound nature and the timelessness of God, “A thousand years are like a day in your sight – for they pass, and they are a watch in the night”. Or God’s reality is set against our illusions, “like a dream in the morning”. For the psalmist, wisdom consists in accepting our limitations: “teach us to count our days, and we shall gain wisdom of heart”. It all depends on God, who is asked to “come back…fill us with your love in the morning, and we shall rejoice”. So he prays, “Let the favour of the Lord our God be upon us, confirm the work of our hands”. There is wisdom in knowing that all depends on this very different God.

In the second reading, Paul is engaged in some delicate negotiation; he is trying to persuade the slave-owner, Philemon, to see things differently, and not punish his runaway slave Onesimus. He wants Philemon to see the slave not as a criminal or a thing, but as Paul’s “child whom I fathered in prison”, and as someone who has served Paul “on your behalf”. Paul very gently intimates that he could give orders to Philemon, but would rather have him give willing assent, and learn to see the runaway as “no longer a slave, but as something more than a slave, a beloved fellow-Christian”. This is a very different view; and we can hardly imagine that Philemon refused Paul’s request.

The gospel for next Sunday is also a reminder that God (and therefore our discipleship) is very different. As so often in Luke, Jesus is pressing on with his journey. The crowds are round him, and Jesus is actually being rather discouraging to them, “If anyone comes to me, and does not hate their own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, and even their own life – they cannot be my disciple”. This is then re-expressed in terms of the cross, “Anyone who does not take up their cross and come after me…”. Next comes a double parable; first, about building a skyscraper, “Sit down and calculate the expense first”, and second about going to war. In such a position, does not a military leader “first sit down and calculate whether he has the capacity with ten thousand to face the general who is advancing against him with twenty thousand?” The service of God is so different that we really need to sit down and think about it. Finally Jesus offers a third category of person who “cannot be my disciple”. This time it is “everyone of you who does not say goodbye to all their possessions”.  The discipleship to which we are called is disconcertingly radical, and we must think very carefully indeed about it. God is very different.