Family Love

"If anyone comes after me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children,

brothers and sisters- yes, even their own life- such a person cannot be my disciple."

Luke 14:26

Wait... what?!  Jesus said those words.  God doesn't contradict Himself, right?  He says to love everyone.  We should be filled with love for others.  And that includes our families.

When we read these words, we read them with a different understanding of the word "hate" than Jesus' culture understood.  So what is He saying here?

"Abraham Rihbany (The Syrian Christ, 98f) points to the use of "hate" in the Bible as an example of linguistic extreme in an Eastern culture. There is no word, he notes, for "like" in the Arabic tongue. "...[T]o us Orientals the only word which can express any cordial inclination of approval is 'love'." The word is used even of casual acquaintances. Extreme language is used to express even moderate relationships.

Luke 14:26 falls into a category of "extreme language," the language of absoluteness used to express a preference, and may refer to disattachment, indifference, or nonattachment without any feelings of revulsion involved."

source here

"...so as actually to renounce his field, oxen, wife, all things, and act as if he hated them, when they stand in competition with him."

source here

I think that when you look at someone that is leaving their family and friends to move all the way around the world in obedience, it may look like hatred (as we Westerners define it).   But really it's just a love for Jesus that surpasses love for anyone else.

Family, I don't hate you.  I love you.  I love you more than anyone else on earth.  I just love Jesus so much more.