Another disciple said to him, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.”
But Jesus told him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.” Then he got into the boat and his disciples followed him.
Matt 8:21-23, NIV
It never ceases to amaze me how much we are all affected by the artificial divisions of Biblical passages (artificial because they post-date the actual writing of the Gospels by centuries or even millennia). To use the technical term, we read the Gospels as a collection of “gobbets” instead of as a continuous narrative. And of course, there are some clear “episodes”; but the layout of our bibles tends to dictate how we see these.
And here is an example. Seeing the crowds surrounding Him, Jesus has given orders to cross to the other side (of the Lake). On the way, He has short interactions with a scribe and then with someone described as ἕτερος δὲ τῶν μαθητῶν, “another of the disciples”. In English this suggests the possibility that the scribe was a disciple as well; but let us focus on this “other” disciple for now.
In our bibles, verse 22 ends a gobbet; verse 23 is the start of a new passage. I disagree.
The context of what the disciple asks is not (as we often seem to read it) just a general “I will follow you at some later date, but first let me do such and such.” Jesus has given orders to cross the Sea of Galilee; and that is the context to this request: “first let me go and honour my Father with funeral rites”. (And then I will join you over the other side.)
It has often be argued, by those missing the context, that the disciple is speaking in general terms, ie when at some point my father is dead and buried, I will follow you then; and of course this reading is possible. But the immediate reading is far more likely, because of what happens next.
Jesus tells him to “let the dead honour their own dead with funeral rites, and you follow me.” And climbing into a boat, His disciples follow Him.
Where is this “other disciple“ now? Unless he flat out disobeyed Jesus’ command (for which there is no evidence), then he is, pretty clearly, in the boat with Jesus.
Which means that very shortly he will be shouting, along with his fellow disciples, “save Lord, we are being destroyed.” And being given a lesson in “don’t be cowards: you tell it to STOP!” (see the Seeing the Kingdom book for a whole chapter on this passage).
Now pan back. Instead of joining the dead in honouring their own dead, this disciple finds himself facing his own imminent demise, and all because Jesus said “you, you follow me”. But in the process he learns a lesson about the difference between the Kingdom of this world, and the Kingdom of God. In the former, we endure the inevitable – loss, grief, separation and so on.
But in God’s Kingdom we call the shots, even – and especially – when the enemy launches an attack. And that is a lesson he would have missed if he had acted on his natural human instinct rather than obeying Jesus’ real-time command to “follow Me!”
Seeing the Kingdom 