Matt 8:21 And another of the disciples said to Him, Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father. (22) But Jesus said to him, Follow Me, and let the dead bury their own dead. Matthew 4:19 And He said to them, Come after Me... (20) And immediately leaving the nets, they followed Him.
The first dead [in Matt. 8:22] refers to those who are spiritually dead. In God's eyes those in the world are spiritually dead. The Lord was saying that the man should let the dead bury his father, while he should follow the Lord. I am not exhorting new believers to not make funeral arrangements for their fathers. I am saying that the dead should bury their own dead. We must lay hold of this principle. We should let go of unfinished business. If we wait until we have finished settling them before we become Christians, we will never have the time. There are hundreds and thousands of items of unfinished business in our families, with our fathers, and in our lives. Let the spiritually dead handle the matters of the dead! This is the principle. This is not to exhort new believers to neglect their family. It means that they should not wait until they have settled all their earthly matters before coming to the Lord. If they do, they will not be able to follow the Lord. Many people want to settle all of their affairs before they believe in the Lord. If so, they will have no opportunity to believe in Him. We should not be bound by matters of the dead. Instead, we should just regard the unsettled matters as settled.
Bible verses are taken from the Recovery Version of the Bible and Words of Ministry from Watchman Nee, Messages for Building Up New Believers, pp. 42. Both are published by Living Stream Ministry, Anaheim, CA. Please visit us at www.emanna.com. Send comments to: [email protected].
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