The call to discipleship requires a total response on our part to the most essential choice:

Lk 9: 59-60. What Jesus is saying is that we are to keep our priorities straight and do that which is of greater importance. To bury one's parent is a natural family duty and expectation. But compared to proclaiming the Kingdom, Jesus says all other duties are secondary. What Jesus is seeking is an attitude of the heart, a pre-conditioned will choice which seeks God's will above all in spite of how others may view our choice. The radical aspect of discipleship is that doing the will of God in all circumstances is to be desired above anything else.

The potential disciple in the Gospel account was making a decision independently of seeking what was God's will in the present situation. He was doing what was expected of him, presuming that this was what God would want him to do. He never even thought that God may have other plans for him. Jesus attempted to open him up to that possibility. Jesus was inviting him to proclaim the Gospel and circumstances were calling him to do the necessary responsibility of a son--burying his dead father. When choices are clear, what do we do? Hope that God will understand why we choose to bury the dead rather than proclaim the Kingdom?

The principle laid out by Paul must always be applied. "Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, so that you may judge what is God's will, what is good, pleasing and perfect" (Ro 12:2).