This parable begins with a rather large speed bump. We must slow down and consider all of God's word.
Does the Lord Jesus Christ, our creator so full of divine love for his creation that he laid down his life to save us, really want us to "hate" our own families? NO! Of course not. Then if the Bible is infallible, how is Luke 14:26 right?
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Let's start by looking at Noah Webster's definition of the word "hate", "to love less".
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Webster's 1828 Dictionary
HATE, verb transitive [Latin odi, for hodi.]
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2. In Scripture, it signifies to love less.
If any man come to me, and hate not father and mother, etc. Luke 14:26.
He that spareth the rod, hateth his son. Proverbs 13:24.
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Does this definition fit Holy Scripture? Yes it does. In fact, the first and greatest commandment is to love the Lord Jesus Christ above ALL else! The second commandment though is to love our neighbor as ourselves.
Matthew 22:37-38
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
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Cost of discipleship: followers of Christ put all else secondary to the Lord. By reading and thinking upon God's word daily as a top priority, we put Jesus first in our lives. We make him our Capstone, the head of our life.
Matthew 8:21-22
21 And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. 22 But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead.
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Psalm 1:1-2
1 Blessed is the man hat walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners,
nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. 2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
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“The family that the Lord is gathering is not the blood family it is the faith family.” unknown