What a privilege it is for me
to be here. I have heard about what God is
doing here in Kingsburg, and of course, I know Scott Artavanis
has been such an encourager to me every time I'm with him, and
he's just Mr. Positive and upbeat. And so now
to see where you serve the Lord, Scott, is a wonderful insight
and privilege for me. And Dominic has taken care of
me last night, and in fact, I got here, if you can believe this,
Scott, I left my Bible back in Los Angeles, so I just panicked,
and I thought I'd left my notes, and I was so happy to eventually
find them. So, all that's to say is I'm
happy to be here, glad that you're here, and I thank God for what
He's doing. in this church. I want you to
take your Bible and turn with me to the gospel of Luke, Luke
chapter 14, and I want to talk to you on counting the cost.
I want to talk to you about the cost of discipleship. And this
morning, we're going to look at verses 25 to 27, and then
tonight, and I really hope that you can be here tonight because
this whole section builds to verses 28 to 35, which is what
we will look at tonight. This morning, I want to begin
by reading this passage, setting it in front of you. It's a text,
no doubt, with which you are very familiar. Luke chapter 14
beginning in verse 25, now large crowds were going along
with him, and he turned and said to them, if anyone comes to me
and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children
and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot
be my disciple. Whoever does not carry his own
cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which one
of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down
and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete
it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able
to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him, saying,
this man began to build and was not able to finish. What king, when he sets out to
meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider
whether he is strong enough with 10,000 men to encounter the one
coming against him with 20,000? Or else, while the other is still
far away, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. So then, none of you can be My
disciple who does not give up all his own possessions. Therefore, salt is good. But
if even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned?
It is useless, either for the soil or for the manure pile. It is thrown out. He who has
ears to hear, letting hear." These were among the most shocking
words to ever come from the lips of the Lord Jesus Christ. These
words are jarring and jolting. These words are intended by Christ
to hit us like a ton of bricks. I mean, what is this? We must
hate our father and mother and brother and sister? In our home,
when my wife and I raised our children, they were not allowed,
my three sons were not allowed to say to their little sister,
I hate you. There were a few times they did.
And they returned to the dinner table with soap bubbles coming
out of their ears. So, what is this? Jesus telling
us that we must hate our father and mother and brother and sister
and even our own life? Here, Jesus, in no uncertain
terms, says that we must hate those whom we love the most. These are strong words. I'm not
going to in any way spray perfume on these words. I'm not going
to neuter these words. I'm not going to water them down.
They are what they are, and Jesus intentionally sent this with
a very sharp edge. They are intended to arrest us.
They are intended to literally capture our soul. What Jesus
is demanding. is that we love Him more than
anyone or anything in this world, or you cannot be His follower. You're going to have to get another
line to get in another line. because those who are following
Christ must be those who are sold out completely. Supreme
affection, highest allegiance given to the King of kings and
to the Lord of lords and everything else in life is a distant secondary. The key word in these verses
that I just read is the last word in verse 26. It is the last
word in verse 27. It is also found in verse 33. It is the word disciple. The word disciple means a student,
a learner, but also a follower of their teacher. And to be a
disciple of Jesus Christ means you have brought your life into
a position of submission under His lordship, and His words are
binding upon your conscience and upon your life. And you are
devoted not only to learn from Him, to be in the school of discipleship,
but that you are committed to a life of obedience from the
heart. to pursue Christ. A disciple here is a genuine
believer in Jesus Christ, where Christ is primary and everything
and everyone else is secondary. So, this morning as we're looking
at these verses, I want to look at the first three verses this
morning, the rest tonight, But I want to begin in verse 25.
I want you to note the crowds. That's what leaps off the page
in verse 25, the crowds, because we see that large crowds were
following Jesus. Verse 25 begins with these three
words, now, large crowds. These were huge. massive, swelling
multitudes of people who are just pouring out of villages
and hamlets and towns to come in behind the Lord Jesus Christ,
enormous throngs. of people. And Jesus, in reality,
was a traveling evangelist. He was not a pastor in one congregation
in one place. He was on the move. He was constantly
traveling from city to city and preaching the gospel. It says
here, large crowds. Please note, not just crowds
singular. It wasn't just a crowd. It's crowds, plural. And not
just crowds, plural, it's large crowds, mega crowds, hundreds
and hundreds, if not thousands of people are coming in behind
Jesus, and they are attracted as He moved from city to city
and creating a sensation. They are attracted by what they
hear and what they see. Never has a man spoken like this
before. and He is healing the sick, and
they are seeing before their very eyes God incarnate." So,
who is in this crowd? If there's hundreds and probably
thousands, who's in this crowd? Well, we know the committed,
first of all, are in this crowd. We know eleven of the twelve
disciples are committed. They've left their nets. They
have left their farms. They have left their tax booth.
They've left it all behind, and they are following Christ, and
they are genuine believers in Christ, and no doubt there are
others like that. There are the curious. There's
always the curious whenever there's a crowd. I mean, no one wants
to eat in a restaurant when no one's there. I mean, you want
to be where other people are. You want to go to a football
game when the stadium is packed out and the large crowd just
attracts more of a crowd. And no doubt there was a sensation
here of people wanting to be where people are. Not certain
why. There were also in this crowd
the confused. Those who had been caught up
in the false religion of apostate Judaism that you would have to
have a works righteousness and work for your salvation and merit
and deserve the righteousness that only God can give, and totally
confused about the way of salvation. Certainly, the Pharisees and
the scribes and the Sadducees were a part of that down in Jerusalem.
And there were also the counterfeit. Judas would be at the head of
that list. He was there that day. Those who thought simply
by being in the crowd and being near Jesus and just hearing Jesus
and just seeing what He does would put them in right standing
with God. There were the counterfeit disciples.
those who were religious but lost. And what is so tragic is
they don't know that they're lost. They are just drawn like
the moth to the flame. They're just drawn to where the
Word is being taught and where other believers are gathered
and where there is a crowd, but there is not the reality of the
new birth in their soul and in their heart. This is the mixed crowd that's
following Jesus. And I have to say how easy it
is to be a part of a large crowd like this. The larger the crowd,
the larger the religious crowd, the easier it is to remain anonymous. The easier it is just to blend
in and not to be exposed. It's easier to look good and
sound religious in a large crowd and just go with the flow, and
yet within the heart and with the will not to be committed
to the Lord Jesus Christ. It's so much easier just to be
a face in the crowd. And that's what's going on here.
And Jesus knew it. And so, look at verse 25, large
crowds were going along. And let me just stress this,
they were just going along. You can almost hear the kind
of the easy believism in that. They were just like logs drifting
downstream, going with the current. They're just going along. And
Jesus turned. He just stopped in His tracks
and did a 180, and He turned around and He faced this massive
multitude that were swelling by the moment, and Jesus, it
says, spoke to them. He spoke directly to them because
Jesus will not have people. just going along. Jesus was never looking for a
crowd. It would be a crowd one day that
would crucify Him. Jesus was looking for a congregation,
not a crowd. And Jesus addressed them with
words that were shocking. that were startling. No doubt
the disciples who were with the Lord thought, well, wow, now
our ministry has really taken off. Now we're really going somewhere. But Jesus saw the crowd in a
totally different way. And Jesus stopped and turned
around and said to them, And the Jesus who spoke to the crowd
that day long ago is the Jesus who speaks to this crowd here
today. And the Jesus who spoke with
audible words two thousand years ago is the Jesus who is speaking
to this congregation through this written Word, and He is
speaking directly and personally to each and every one of us here
today as if we are the only one in the building. He is speaking
to you this very moment, and he who has ears to hear must
hear. I want you to note second, not
only the crowds in verse 25, but the call at the beginning
of verse 26. Now here is the open invitation
that Jesus extends to the crowd. Notice the beginning of verse
26, the first five words, if anyone comes to Me. Please note how open this invitation
is. It is as open as all those who
heard Him speak these words. With these words, Jesus is swinging
open the gates of paradise. And this is synonymous with saying,
whosoever. This is the free offer of the
gospel that is being extended to this massive crowd. If anyone, whatever your name,
whatever your age, whatever your background, whatever your gender,
whatever your place in society, whether you're religious or not
religious, whether you're going through prosperity or adversity,
no matter who you are, from whence you have come, if anyone, he
says, comes to me. To come to Christ is synonymous
with saving faith. To come to Christ means to take
steps of faith from where you are in the kingdom of darkness,
from where you are in the world system, and to turn your back
to a life pursuit of sin, and to take a step of faith and come
all the way to Christ. When Jesus said, if anyone comes
to Me, He did not mean for them with their feet to walk to Him. They were already walking with
their feet to Him. And there was a deeper spiritual
meaning. When He says, if anyone comes to Me, He is inviting them
in their soul and in their heart to leave behind where they have
been living in the world and now identify with Him and come to Him by faith. And Jesus
would say in John 6 verse 35, I am the bread of life. He who
believes in Me will never hunger, and he who comes to Me will never
thirst. In that verse, to believe in
Christ and to come to Christ are synonymous, parallel statements. And in John 7 verse 37, Jesus
said, if anyone thirsts, let him come to Me. and drink, and
out of His innermost being shall flow rivers of living water." And please note, he says, if
anyone comes to me, to come to me personally, to come to me
directly, not come to religion. not come to a meeting, not come
to a service. I mean, that's fine and good
in His place, but to come to the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Jesus is inviting that entire
multitude of people who were following Him physically to come
to Him spiritually. This call is just as open and
just as extended here today. As His Word is being taught,
this invitation to come to Christ is being extended to you, this
very moment, to come to Christ. And how loving of Christ, how
open-hearted of Christ, how large-hearted of Christ. I know some golf clubs, meaning
golf courses, it's not open to everybody. I mean, you have to
be a special somebody. In fact, you can't even ask to
be asked. You have to wait, and it only goes to a select few. I was lecturing last week at
the Master's Seminary with Michael Reeves from Oxford, and he's
a member of a very exclusive club in downtown, or in the St. James area of London, and it's
where Winston Churchill was a member. And they have a very exclusive
tie, and only the members of this club get to wear this snooty
little tie. That's not how the kingdom of
God operates. It's this invitation goes out as far and as wide as
the Word of God is proclaimed around the world. And this invitation
has gone out to you and is going out to you yet one more time
this very moment. But I want you to note third,
the condition. Because as we look into verse
26, there's actually a condition here, a condition to respond
to the call. Now, the call is open and wide,
but the one who issues the call sets the terms, and that's Jesus. And so, in order to answer the
call, Jesus gives some very specific conditions here, and they are
jolting, and they are very strong words. Jesus is not trying to
beat the drum and just grow the ministry numerically. Jesus was
never after quantity. He was always after quality. And this is the kind of follower
Jesus demanded. If anyone comes to Me," verse
26, and does not, let me just pause there for a moment. Do
you see how negative Jesus is stating this? He is putting this
in the negative because He's intending it to have a sharp
edge, for it to prick our conscience and poke into our ribcage. If anyone comes to Me and does
not hate. That word leaps off the page. And does not hate his own father
and mother, those closest earthly relationships, those who literally
brought you into this world and nurtured you and cared for you
and raised you and gave their soul for you? And then he says, and does not
hate his own wife, the love of your life, and children, those
whom you cherish and all but adore, and brothers and sisters,
those that you grew up with, those that you shared a bedroom
with, those that you played with, those that you worked with, Jesus
said, if you don't hate them, you cannot be My disciple. And how are we to take this?
Does not the fifth commandment, Exodus 20 and verse 12 say, honor
your father and mother? It's the first commandment with
a promise. It's the bridge from the first four to the final six. It's the most critical earthly
relationship that you would honor your father and your mother. And did not Jesus say in the
Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter 5 that we are to love
even our enemies? Does not your heavenly Father
love even His enemies and cause the rain to fall on the just
and the unjust? And did not Jesus, when He was
hanging upon the cross in John chapter 19, with all but His
last dying breath, look down from the cross and with His final
bit of business say, to his mother, mother, behold your son, looking
at John the Apostle that his mother would be taken care of
even after his death, and son, behold your mother, and was just
the matchmaker almost, bringing the two together. To the very
end, he's loving his mother. And did not Paul say in 1 Timothy
5, if a man does not take care of his own household, he is worse
than an infidel? You take care of your house first,
and then take care of others. So, what are we to take of this? Because we are those who believe
the Bible. Well, the answer is in the passage
that was read earlier in the service. If you would turn to
Matthew chapter 10, I think it would be worth your turning there
for just the moment. And in Matthew chapter 10 and
verse 37, we have the answer by allowing Scripture to interpret
Scripture. Thomas Watson, the great Puritan,
said, as only a diamond is sharp enough to cut another diamond,
so only Scripture is sharp enough to interpret Scripture. So, here
we lay side by side parallel passages, yet stated in slightly
different words. In Matthew 10 verse 37, here
is the key that unlocks the door. He who loves father or mother
more than me is not worthy of me, and he who loves son or daughter
more than me is not worthy of me." Now light bulbs come on. Now we can see as the light of
Matthew 10 shines onto the text of Luke chapter 14, we see it
clearly that Jesus is using a figure of speech known as hyperbole
where you deliberately overstate something with exaggeration so
as to have impact into the ear of the listener. And boy, does
he get our attention with these words, because they still hit
us like a ton of bricks. What Jesus means in Luke 14 is
not that we hate our father and mother and brother and but that
by comparison, the love that we have for Jesus Christ is so
primary and so paramount and is so exceedingly great that
the love that we have for Jesus Christ would make the love that
we have for our own loved ones appear to be as hate. And the fact of the matter is,
the more you love Jesus Christ, the more you're going to love
your father and your mother. And the more you love Jesus Christ,
the more you're going to love your wife and give yourself to
her as Christ gave Himself to the church. And the more you
love Christ, the more you're going to love your children,
and the more you're going to love your brother and your sister,
even when they're difficult to love, because your love for Christ
is so flooding into your heart and to your soul that it is spilling
over in your relationships with others. So, what Jesus is calling
for here in verse 26 is supreme devotion and unrivaled allegiance
to Him. He must be number one. He will not ride in anyone's
back seat. He must be number one. And not
just one on a list, one in your heart, that He is your chief
affection, that you adore Him, you worship Him, you love Him,
that your heart is pounding and beating with affection for Him. He who has been forgiven much
loves much. But now Jesus goes for the juggler.
He goes for the juggler bang. Rather than backing off, He now
plunges the knife deeper. Sometimes when I'm preaching,
my wife will sit on the front row, and I get pretty worked
up and animated, and she'll give me what we call the look. And
the look means settle down. You're coming on too strong with
everybody. Jesus doesn't back down at this
point. He actually raises the ante.
He actually becomes more aggressive. And He says at the end of verse
26, As if saying amen to what he
has already just said, he just amened his own sermon. Yes, you
can tweet that if you want. Yes, and even his own life. Or he cannot, he cannot, he cannot
be my disciple. Now, you know the difference
between may and can. There's a difference between may not
and cannot. May is a word of permission. Can is a word of
ability. Oh, you've got permission if
you want to come, but you do not have the ability to come
until you meet these conditions. Now, what does this mean, hate
even his own life? In other words, you cannot love
your little universe and your little life and what you have
going on and what you're about, your schedule, your activities,
your circles of relationships more than you love me. Self dies hard. What does self-love look like?
Self-centeredness, self-preoccupation, self-flattery, self-indulgence,
self-promotion, self-pampering, self-pity, self-ease, self-pleasures,
self-exaltation, self-esteem. Self-love is being self-absorbed. It's being self-consumed. It's
being self-focused. It's being self-fixed. If we are to live for Jesus Christ
and to follow Him, Jesus is saying we cannot live for ourselves. We have to live for Him. The
self must die. And to be a true believer in
Jesus Christ, at the very heart, when you peel back the layers
of authentic Spirit generated saving faith, there is a strong
heartbeat, a strong pulse of love and devotion and affection
for the person of Jesus Christ. 1 Peter 1 verse 8 says, though
you do not see Him, you love Him. And Romans 8 verse 28 says,
those who love God, those are the ones who are called according
to His purpose. In Ephesians 6 and verse 24,
it says, those who love our Lord Jesus Christ with a love that
is incorruptible, those are the true believers. So, I have to ask you at this
point, do you love God? Do you love Christ? Do you have
a heart affection for Christ? Is He your supreme object of
the devotion of your heart and soul? because to be a true follower
of Christ, this is what He commands, and this is what He requires.
But all we have to do is to behold His glory. All we have to do
is to see who He is and to know what He has done for us, and
to see what He is doing this very moment. And the more that
we see Him, as Piper would say, the more we savor Him. The more
we look unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, the more
our heart is enlarged. And when we don't love Him as
we should, it's because of other distractions that have drawn
our focus to other things, whether it's a crisis or whether it's
circumstances. That's when our heart diminishes,
like at the church at Ephesus, Ephesians, Revelation 2 verse
4, but I have this against you, you have left your first love.
It's because they had taken their eyes off of Christ and were just
into the activities of everything. And so, what Jesus is saying
at the very heart, when you put your finger on the vital nerve
of a true believer, there is a pulse of love for Jesus Christ. Now fourth and finally, I want
you to note the cross in verse 27, the cross, because Jesus now
makes one of the most demanding statements to ever come from
His lips. And I want to say it again, rather
than backing off and now saying something kind of warm and fuzzy
to draw everyone back in. Jesus now aggressively, I mean,
Dominic, he goes into full court press. I mean, he amps it up. I mean, he goes into two-minute
offense here at the end, Bo. Notice what he says in verse
27, whoever, that parallels with anyone in verse 26, whoever,
and again, it's this open invitation, but he says, whoever does not. He keeps putting this in the
negative. In order, it's almost like thumping our forehead to
get our attention. Whoever does not carry His own
cross and come after Me. Now, please note, to come to
Christ is inseparably connected with coming after Christ. Everyone
who comes to Christ genuinely will come after Christ progressively. In other words, for those of
you who know theology, justification and sanctification are inseparably
bound together. Everyone who is justified is
immediately sanctified and begins this lifelong pursuit of growing
into the image of Jesus Christ. In other words, to use a different
metaphor from Matthew chapter 7, the narrow gate can only lead
down the narrow path. You cannot go through the narrow
gate and then walk the broad path. No, it's a narrow gate
that leads to a narrow path. It's a broad gate that leads
to a broad path. You can't mix and match the two. So, if you want to know which
gate you went through, all I have to do is ask you, which path
are you on? Because which path you are on
will answer the question, which gate you went through. And so, what Jesus is saying
in verse 27, and I don't want you to miss the impact of this,
is that those who come to Christ in verse 26 will come after Christ
in verse 27. In other words, no one can just
parrot a prayer and sign a card and join a church and then live
like the devil. No, if you have genuinely come
to Christ, you have just now started the journey of following
after Christ. But what does this mean to carry
your own cross? And this will be our final thoughts because
I actually have never seen someone carry a cross. That's not something
we do in America in the 21st century. What does this mean? Of course, we have to go back
in time 2,000 years to really understand the significance of
these words. And the fact is no one in the
Roman Empire 2,000 years ago would mistake what Jesus meant
by this. They had seen it again and again
and again, and it was a sight that they would never forget.
If you ever saw it once, you would remember it the rest of
your life. A cross was an instrument of
death, a savage death, a severe death. The cross was the form
of capital punishment. It was the electric chair of
the first century. It was the gas chamber of the
first century. It was a despicable form of public
capital punishment that was so heinous no Roman citizen could
be subjected to death by crucifixion on a cross. And when someone would carry
their cross, it was because they have stood in the court of law
before the judge, just like Jesus stood before Pilate. And when
they are condemned to death, they are sentenced to death by
crucifixion, perhaps on the other side of town, and you would leave
the judge's room, and you would be given
a crossbeam to put on your back, and you would now be forced to
carry the crossbeam all the way to the site of execution. And the whole town would turn
out. and they would line the streets as though it were a parade
because it was intended to be public. It was intended to make
a statement by Rome. Only Rome could issue this death
penalty. Israel under Pax Romana could
not issue this crucifixion, and Rome intended to make statements.
that you rise up against our authority, this is what it will
mean. We want everyone to see this
lonely figure carrying His cross to the execution site, and what
it meant was, you are a condemned man, you have been judged in
the court, the evidence has been presented, you have been found
wanting, there is now the death sentence upon your head, and
you are a dead man walking. It is as though you are already
dead. It was the ultimate humiliation.
It was the dreaded death march. And in Jerusalem, it was down
the Via Della Rosa. And Jesus now stops and turns
to these wannabe followers with some true followers. and says
to them something that must have gone through them like an electrical
shock, that if anyone, whoever does
not carry His own cross, He's not talking, Jesus is not talking
about His cross. He hasn't even been crucified yet. Whoever does not carry His own
cross and come after Me, and Jesus is headed to Jerusalem
And Jesus will be condemned in six trials, three Jewish and
three Roman, and Jesus will be forced to carry His cross and
will buckle under the weight and a man named Simon will pick
up the cross but go to Golgotha and go to Calvary, and there
Jesus will be nailed to the cross beam and nailed to the vertical
beam and be hoisted up, separated from God and the earth and from
men and there to die that ignominious death in our place. But Jesus
says, if you're going to be one of My disciples, you're going
to have to carry your cross and die to self and die to this world
and die to the applause of this world and the approval of this
world and live for amens out of heaven and come after Me as
I am headed to the very same destination." To come after Christ
means that we go where He leads us, that we live as He requires,
that we speak what He teaches, that we live as He lived, that
we love what He loves, that we hate what He hates, that we walk
as He walked. that we believe as He believed. And Jesus was saying, spiritually
speaking, those who would follow Him, and this begins with me,
and it extends to you, and it extends to every single person
around the world, in every generation, on every continent, in every
place, that we must die to self. And we must submit, submit to
His supreme authority. and we must agree with God's
verdict upon our own lives that we have been weighed in the balances
and our lives fall short of the glory of God. It's a sobering invitation, a
soul-chilling invitation that Jesus gave, but for those who
accept it and who respond, It is a soul uplifting. It is a soul gratifying. It is a soul that is filled with
ten thousand joys and charms because we gain far more than
we ever give up. I mean, really, why would we
hang on to our crummy little life? I mean, really, what has
it amounted to in our flesh? in order now to be a follower
of the King of kings and the Lord of lords, to be a follower
of the second person of the Trinity, to be a follower now of Him who
is the Alpha and the Omega? What a… the greatest privilege
any of us will ever know, the greatest adventure we will ever
know, the greatest life that we will ever know. I've come
that you might have life and have it abundantly. The last
thing I want to stress is the very end of verse 27. He says,
and come after Me. Again, the emphasis is on the
person of Christ. It's not on an institution. It's
not on a movement. It's not on a cause, but it is
to the person of Christ. Now, if we will follow the person
of Christ, He will put you in the church, and He will put you
in ministry, and He will put you in the greatest movement
this world's ever known, the movement of the kingdom of God.
But to enter into the kingdom, we have to be a follower of Christ.
Christianity is Christ. Christianity is to know Christ.
It is to believe in Christ. It is to trust Christ. It is
to worship Christ. It is to adore Christ. It is
to treasure Christ. It is to serve Christ. It is
to follow Christ. It is to obey Christ. It is to
submit to Christ. It is to, my whole life is Christ. I don't even have a life outside
of Christ. In Philippians 1 verse 21, Paul
said, for me to live is Christ. That's it. And then to die is gain. Why? Because I go be with Christ.
And to live for anyone or anything else other than for Christ, to
die is loss. To die is eternal loss. But to live for Christ in this
life is to live for that which leads us into the very
presence of God. I want to be very clear from
this text that Jesus will not follow us. We must follow Him. He will not follow our agenda.
We follow His agenda. He will not get on our path.
We follow on His path. And as we follow Him, He does
not tell us where this is going. It's a walk of faith. He holds
the future. He knows the way. He shows the
way. More than that, He goes the way
with us. If we were applying for a job
and then consulted with our parents, I know my father would want to
know, so what does this mean in five years? Where would this
put you with the company in ten years? What are the benefits? What's the retirement? What is
the health insurance? What all comes with this? And
Jesus is saying, you just trust Me. You just follow Me. I know where this is going. And
I don't want to be mistaken, you need insurance, okay? And
you need to have a plan. But even with our plans, He overrides
for His plans. We just heard about that in the
testimony earlier in this service, the young man going to Southern
Seminary. God knows what's best. So, we must follow Christ. We
must follow Him personally. No one else can follow Christ
for you. Your spouse cannot follow Christ for you. Your parents
cannot follow Christ for you. You personally must follow Christ. You must follow Him wholeheartedly.
You cannot follow Him half-hearted. He is saying to this crowd, it
is all or nothing. We have to be all in with Christ. We have to follow Him repentantly,
meaning we turn our back to the world. We turn our back to our
former manner of life. We must follow Him obediently.
We come under the authority of His Word. We must follow Him
openly. He who is ashamed of me before
this sinful and adulterous generation, the same will I be ashamed of
when I come into the glory of my Father with the holy angels.
We have to follow Him openly before the world. We have to
follow Him comprehensively. There's no part of my life that
is segmented away and not a part of following Christ. Every step
of my life's journey is following Christ, whether it's my home
life, my ministry life, my work life, my recreational life. It's
all in the package of following Christ. We must follow Christ
exclusively. We cannot follow Jesus and anything
else and anyone else. It's all Christ, solus Christos,
and we must follow Him unconditionally. We must be willing to go wherever
He sends us. We must be willing to go anywhere,
do anything, pay any price in following Christ. We must follow
Him immediately, not tomorrow, not next week. We must follow
Him now today, and we must follow Him permanently. It's not a weekend. journey is now until the end
of our life. Every moment of every day for
the rest of our lives, there is no turning back. We have burned our bridges behind
us. We cannot go back to where we
once were and what we once did. That's over. That's buried. That
old man has been buried. We now move forward by faith. and we follow Christ. And Jesus
ends verse 27 and says, or you cannot be My disciple. With Jesus, there's no fine print
in the contract. He puts it all out for the hundreds
and the thousands to see and to read, and He is still speaking
clearly to us today that we just can't go with the flow of the
crowd. We have to break from the pack. We have to break from
the world. We have to break from the culture. we have to follow Christ. And this is non-negotiable. This is obligatory. This is mandatory. But whatever the sacrifice to
follow Christ, I want to say it again, we gain far more than
we ever give up. We give up our guilt for His
grace. We give up our sins for His salvation. We give up our emptiness for
His fullness. We give up our world for His
world. We give up our spiritual bankruptcy
for His vast riches. We give up our dirt for His diamonds. That sounds like a good deal
to me. This is Biloh Selchai, and the height will take you
all the way to the heights of heaven. But in order to follow Him, a
blind man could see it. A deaf man could hear this. There's
no room for any misunderstanding. It doesn't take much of a person
to be a follower of Christ. It just takes all there is of
them. Give your all to Him, and He will take it and remold it
and use it for His glory. I wish I had a thousand lives.
I'd give every one of them to Christ, and I'd follow Him with
every single one of those lives.