I've never really understood what it was about Jesus' speech that made so many of the disciples say, "I'm outta here." Surely a line got crossed. Perhaps the "eat my flesh, drink my body" was too close to ancient pagan practices for them. Maybe it was his identifying himself as the Son of Man, that end-time, messianic figure of Daniel. But whatever it was, it was too much for them to bear. They even said it, "this teaching is difficult, who can accept it."

Some of the teachings of Jesus are difficult to accept. There are those things said and written that defy human reason - walking on water, water to wine, resurrection. These are things that are held in faith. Faith that God can and does act in human affairs in ways we cannot understand.

Then there are those teachings that hit us square in the jaw. The things we wish Jesus hadn't said. The demands on us we wish Jesus had not demanded. The things in scripture we wish weren't there.

"No one comes to the Father except through me." (John 4:16) Hard to accept if you have friends or loved ones who are faithful Jews or Muslims. Yet, there it is.

"Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me" (Matt. 10:37) How does this jive with "Family Values".

"I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery" Yet, we allow remarriage as a matter of course.

These and many others are hard to take sometimes. We wish they weren't there. But they are. And if we take our faith seriously, we have to take all of scripture seriously. It's not enough to simply say, "Oh, that was back then in a backward, unsophisticated culture." It's not enough to claim difficulty in translation from then to now and from one culture to another.

If we are to claim our faith with any sort of integrity, I think we have 2 options. We can throw up our hands and say, "I'm outta here", or we can stay and wrestle with the difficult passages, and the difficult realities of our lives.

Let me share a very private part of my life with you, not for any reason other than to show you the journey God has put me on.

You may not know this - I don't make a big deal out of it, but I am divorced and remarried. I was married for 2 years to my college sweet-heart. What we had in college just didn't translate well in the "real world". It was amicable and there were no children. I moved to Dallas and 4 years later, met and married Kari who brought her 3 year old daughter, Tasha, with her. I am divorced and remarried.

In Matthew, my marriage with Kari is called adultery. I had a hard time getting approved for seminary because of that. I was the first divorced and remarried person to go through the entire process in that diocese.

I look at my marriage and I know we have been blessed by God. Great kids, and wonderful life. And I truly believe that, at least once in a while, we have reflected the love of Christ for his Church. How can adultery do that?

I can't just say, scripture was wrong. I can't say that scripture applies to everyone else except me. I can't simply say that divorce was different back then. Or even to say that what Jesus was really about here was raising the rights of women (with which I agree). No. Scripture says what it says and I have to deal with it. And the way I deal with it is to say that I am willing to live in that tension between scriptural mandate and our experience of God's blessing.

When I die, God may tell me that my life was a lie. If heaven would require me to disavow my marriage to Kari, I would chose another destination. My God wouldn't do that.

Living in that kind of tension is difficult. That is a cost of being a disciple, to use Dietrich Bonhoeffer's words. If I didn't believe in Jesus and call him my Lord and savior, what it says in scripture wouldn't be a problem. Wouldn't apply to me. I could go on guided only by whatever sense of morality I might have. I could say, "I'm outta here" and never be concerned about it again.

Let me add, I do think that we need to look at the cultural context in which scripture was written. Especially when we're looking at the ritual laws of Leviticus and the rest of Torah. But that is different than ignoring them. As one of our Prayer Book Collects says, we must read, learn, mark and inwardly digest the words of scripture. Even if we choose to go a different way, we will have at least allowed scripture to inform our decision.

Joshua set down some rules for the people of Israel. They had to stop following idols. He told them to choose whom they would serve.

Faith is a gift, but it is also a choice. We are free as human beings to worship whom or what ever we'd like. God won't stop us. We can pick and choose the parts of Christian doctrine we want. We can blend Buddhism, Christianity and New Age and call it our own religion. God gave us that ability. It is our choice.

But choice always comes with a consequence. One of those hard sayings is from John, "No one comes to the Father except through me." When we turn away from Christ, we must do so in light of this claim.

In legal affairs, we often hear about making an informed decision. Well, that's true in our relationship with Christ. We need to make informed decisions. By this, I mean understanding the ramifications and consequences of our actions. Not liking what the bible, or the church has said isn't good enough. That's what Bonhoeffer would call cheap grace.

When a bunch of Jesus' followers left, he asked the 12, "Do you also wish to go away.?" Peter finally got it right. He said, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

It's hard to think that salvation is through Christ alone. It's hard to think that our marriages are sinful. It's hard to think that women shouldn't speak in church. It's hard to hear that we should love Jesus more than our own children. But, that is what we have been told. That is what it costs to be Jesus follower. It takes accepting the inability of us to live up to the expectations of God. It takes living in the tension between experience and revelation.

There is a cost to discipleship. It is the transformation of our lives into the likeness of Jesus. It's giving up those things that keep us from the love of God. And it is taking seriously those demands on us that convict and challenge us.

Sometimes we like to think of God as soft and gentle, like a big teddy bear. Sometimes we hear of a God that is demanding, ferocious and authoritarian. There are scriptural references to both. But, I think we know that there is a lot more about God than wither extreme. The truth exists in the tension between God's Grace and God's judgment.

It's not easy being a Christian. As tough as it might be, we, as the Israelites before us must choose to day whom we will serve.

It's our choice. "I'm outta here" or "as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord."