Chapter 14. Let's begin reading there. Verse 25. Our Lord has just concluded This
great parable of the great supper tells of the neglect and carelessness
of those that were invited to come to the supper. They all
had excuses. One said, A certain man made
a great supper and bade many. He sent his servant at supper
time to say unto them that will bid him come for all things are
now ready. They began to make excuse. First
said, I bought a piece of ground and I got to go and see it. Have
me excused. I can't come. And another said, I bought five
yoke of oxen and I got to go see if they'll work or not. How
about excusing me? Maybe some other time. And another
said, well, I've married a wife and I can't come either. How
about having me excused? Maybe some other time when I'm
not busy. After I get settled. After I've got the title deed
to my ground, got it fenced in and everything, got a house built
and all, maybe I'll be able to come around and see you sometime.
Right now, Jesus, I don't have time. I'm real busy. I've got
these oxen, you know, these animals out here, and I've got to I got
to take care of them, and if I ever get down and get a little
tired and what, maybe I'll come around and drop in and see you
some Sunday morning. Married a wife, I just can't
come. Goodbye, Jesus. Goodbye, Jesus. So he says down
here in verse 25, a great multitude of people was around him when
he spake this. And he turned and he said unto them, If any
man come to me, Talking about what it is to be
a disciple. No need to talk about when a
man is a disciple until we find out what a disciple is. If any
man come to me, that's the first thing he's got to have. A man's
got to come to Him. Up here they wouldn't come. He bid a great
feast. He said, all things are ready. Everything's ready. The
table is spread. We've got the desserts. We've
got the main course. We've got the delicacies, we've
got everything that's needed and necessary for a great and
glorious feast. All things are ready. Come on.
I can't. Why not? Well, this excuse and
that excuse and so forth wouldn't come. If any man come to me,
and say come to the church, and say come to the altar, I read
here in the paper, Sunday's paper, this morning's paper, how big
it was, and the church news there, were having some religious service
of some sort, and said they all went to the altar. What did they
go to the altar for? Where is the altar? Is there such a thing as an altar?
An altar is where you kill people. An altar is where you slay animals.
That's what the altar was in the Bible. Bring your sacrifice and land
upon the altar, a dead, bloodied, bruised, obnoxious looking dead
animal. Bring that up and put it on the
altar. It doesn't say anything about people meeting God at an
altar. But people are strange, aren't
they? See how far away they can get from the truth. If any man
come to me, come to him in a person. I said that, well, if I said
it a million times, I'd be exaggerating a few times. But I've said it
a lot of times, salvation is not in a system. It's not in
a doctrine. It's not in a church. It's not in a ceremony. It's
not in a ritual. It's not in a denomination. It's not in this,
not in that. It's in a person. That's where it's at. It's in
a person. If a man never gets to Christ, he can have this perfect
happiness and perfect peace and perfect righteousness, pardon,
justification, sins forgiven, clothed in the impeccable righteousness
of the lovely Lord Jesus Christ. Come to me, come to me. Not to
the preacher, come to me. Not to the altar, come to me.
Not to the doctrine of speaking in some unknown, not that, come
to me. Well, all right, he said, if
any man come to me. Some characteristics of true
disciples set forth here, characteristics. If any man come to me and hate
not his father, his mother, wife, and children, and brethren, and
sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. Now you underscore those last
five words. He cannot He cannot be my disciple."
Now, understand who's doing the talking here, and who he's talking
to. This is the Son of God, the Author
of eternal life, the Source of eternal life, the
Prince of life Himself, saying with His own lips to people like
you and I, that have been gathered together with Him, And He says
to them, if any man come to Me and hate not his father and his
mother and his brother and his sister, yea, even his own life
also, he cannot be one of My disciples. He cannot be My disciple. And whosoever doth not bear his
cross, bear his burden, and come after Me, A lot of people
bear their burden, but they quit coming after Jesus. Goodbye,
Jesus. He cannot be my disciple. For
which of you, intending to build a tower, or a great big house,
sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he hath sufficient
to finish it? Who among us is going to build
a great big house, and we have him first sit down and say, I
figured that the bricks would cost so much, and this would
cost so much, and that would cost so much, and it comes right
down there to, there's the sum total of all of it, and I haven't
got a penny, but I'm going to start out and build one anyhow.
Well, lest happily, verse 29, lest happily after he hath laid
the foundation, he just dug the footer and got some concrete,
is ready to go, and is not able to finish it. And it's dawned
on him, well I can't go from here, they won't give me any
more credit. Then everybody comes along and they begin to mock
him and laugh at him and say, well he started something but
he can't finish it. And they just laugh, say, look over there,
see that monument, that's a monument over there to the failure of
an imbecile, of a simpleton. He started something, but he's
going to build a great big house, look at that big foundation out
there, it's 40 by 80. He was going to build a great big three-story
condominium. He was going to do it, but he
didn't have no money. He didn't have no money when
he started. And he got out there and dug the footer himself, dug
the hole, and he got some concrete on credit. And that's as far
as he went. He's the laughing stock of this
whole territory. He's been telling everybody what he was going to
do. He's up and down the streets and says, yeah, I'm building
this great big house. Three-story house. I'm swimming pools, and
gymnasiums, and having five bathrooms, and eight or nine bedrooms. I'm building a great big house.
They said, are you really? Oh yeah. But they said, look
there's a monument in his face. People laughed at him. Mocked
him. Mocked him. Saying, this man began to build.
He started, but he couldn't finish. He didn't count the cost. He
didn't count the cost, Tim. That's what he's talking about.
He should have sat down and said, now it's going to cost so much
for this and so much for that and so much for something else.
I better get a hold of some money before I start. He wouldn't count
the cost. He didn't know what was involved.
What our Lord is saying here about being a disciple is that
we better find out what's involved in being a disciple before we
say, I'm going to start. Or what king gone to war against
another king sitteth down not first, and consulteth whether
he is able with ten thousand to meet them that cometh against
him with twenty thousand." I better call my generals in here. Is
my ten thousand men, are they equivalent? Is each one of my
soldiers equivalent to four of theirs? Have I really got some
men in this army? Or have I just got some draftees
that's just here because the government forced them into service?
And they're just here waiting until their year's up and they're
going home. They're not concerned. They're
not real warriors and soldiers. They didn't come to make a lifetime
out of this thing. They're not committed for 25
or 30 years. They're not committed to this
thing for a lifetime. They're not occupied with it.
They're not army men, inward and outward. Their life is not
the army. All they're thinking about is
4 o'clock in the afternoon when they can get their liberty pass
and go out into town and spend their money and have a big time
and come back in and that's all they are to it. They're just
waiting until their year's up and then they're going home.
If that's the only kind of men we got here, Captain, hey, we
better not go out there and face that fellow with 20,000 soldiers.
We better not start no war. We better shut up. We better compromise. Maybe we
better surrender. We better not fight that fellow.
We're going to lose some lives here. That's what he's talking
about. Or else, while the other is yet
a great way off, he sendeth an ambassador. He sends up a representative
to speak for him, and he desires of this man with 20,000 soldiers,
let's make peace. Let's make peace. My army won't
do it. I just know they won't do it
because they're not committed. They don't know what's involved.
They've been playing. They're playing soldiers. Have
you ever seen fellas that play soldiers? Put the heat to them. Put them down in the foxholes.
Put them down with the bullets, and the guns, and the cannons,
and all of this is going off, and brother, they said, whoo! I don't know about this kind
of army. I've never been in this kind of war, but this is a war.
Ah, let's make peace. Let's make peace. I read there
recently where, over there in Korea, where some boy was a,
he said fine boy. He said he was on guard duty
there. He just took his gun, shot the lock off the gate, and
he walked out and went over on the other side. Demanded, or asked, required,
that he might defect unto the enemy. Maybe they had a lot of
them. They desired peace. They didn't
want to fight. But he's a wise man. It's a wise man that won't
fight if he ain't got enough fellas over there at least on
his side to give him a good battle. So likewise, whosoever he be
of you. Remember now, the Son of God
is talking to people like you and I gathered here, a whole
multitude of people. They just heard the parable about
the great feast where I wasn't given an excuse, I can't come,
I can't come. The Lord said, well, if you do
come, I want you to know what's required of you. I want you to
know what you become involved in if you come. He said, likewise,
whosoever be of you that forsaketh, not all that he hath, that is,
this soldier. He said, well, brother, I like
this army. I like being a soldier. I really
like it. I'm a 30 year man. I like to
chow. I've heard guys be in the army. I can't stand to eat this. I
can't stand to eat that. And I've seen other guys there
get fat on what they couldn't stand. They said it's a whole lot better
than what we had. And they said, well, look here,
we're getting $500, $600 a month. We never made that kind of money
in our lives. We're getting our medical bills
paid, our dental work taken care of. They buy our clothes. We
got a place to stay. They take your armor. Well, I'm
a full-time soldier. I'm sold out. I'm committed to
the Army. And you find a man that's committed
to the army, he'll respond to his responsibility. You don't
be just dead weight. That's what he's talking about.
So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all,
that he have and be committed, cut all the strings, burn all
the bridges behind you. Where do you live? I live in
Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Asked an old soldier, boy. The old Navy and Marine man has
been there at his life. Ask him where he lives. He doesn't
say he lives in West Virginia. I live in Fort Sill, Oklahoma.
That's where I live. My barracks, I live in the third
barracks on the right down there in street A. That's where I live. He can tell you who his captain
is and he can go on up the line. Committed! Committed! Verse 34 says, salt is good. It's good for high blood pressure
too. That's what they tell me. If you take enough of it, your
blood will begin to cause you trouble. Salt is good. It's good. It's a preservative. It's got savor. It's got flavor. It's good. But if the salt has lost its
savor, It's preservative. It's quality of goodness. If
it's lost it, wherewith shall it be seasoned? Can't season
with it then if it's lost its flavor or savor or saltness. Well, what's it good for? What's
it good for? What's salt good for that is
not salt no more? That will not you put it in You
put it in the barrel of pickles or the cabbage and it doesn't
do the work. What's it good for? What's a
big block of salt or a great big barrel of salt good for if
it's lost its savor? It must be good for something.
Well, you make a road out of it. Can you pack it down and
make a road? No, it ain't no good for that.
Just dry up and blow away. Well, what is it good for? Must
be good for something. No, it ain't no good for anything.
It's not good for the land. You can't put it on the land,
it doesn't help the land out any. It's not good to put on
the downhill. What's the downhill good for?
It's just a place for a carnival of worms. Little worms, big worms,
red worms, earthworms, wiggling worms. That's all it's good for. It's not even good to put on
the No wonder our Lord says, but for men, just cast it out.
Just cast it out, that's all it's good for. Then he said,
he that hath ears to hear. If you've got ears to hear what
I'm saying to this multitude, he said, I hope I have ears tonight.
I hope God the Holy Spirit will give me ears to hear what the
Lord Jesus Christ is saying here. I want to hear. I really want
to hear. I want to know. You've got some
ears, he said? Well, then hear what I'm saying.
What's he saying? The first thing that I think
that we can learn from these ten verses of Scripture is this,
that a true Christian, a true disciple, must be ready, if need
be, to give up everything for Christ's sake. Notice I said,
if need be. He must be ready, if need be,
to give up, to forsake all for Christ's sake. That is, that
his life might be consumed with the Lord Jesus Christ. That is,
from start to finish. That is, from his early rising
in the morning till his going to bed at night. It means not
just one day, two days, or five days, or six days, or seven days.
It means every day of every year, as long as he lives. That's what
it means. If need be. Verse 25 says, If any man come
to me and hate not his father, and his mother, and his wife,
and his children, brethren, and sisters, and his own life, he
cannot be my disciples. Well, now listen. This expression
here where it says, he, not his father, and his mother, and his
wife, and his children, and his brothers and sisters, and his
own life, now that's got to be, as the fellow said, that's got
to be splained. Got to splain that a little bit.
Or if you don't splain it, you're going to contradict other verses
of Scripture. It is not the duty, he's not
saying here that the duty of a Christian is to hate his father,
and hate his mother, and hate his wife, and hate his brother,
and hate his sister. That's not what he's saying.
That's not what he means. That needs to be explained, or
you're going to contradict. The religion of the Lord Jesus
Christ is what? It's a religion of loving one
another. He said, by this shall all men
know that you're my disciples, that you love one another. He
said, we're to love all men. A man cannot be a Christian and
hate anybody. I don't care who he is. He may
appear to be a Christian. He may say he's a Christian.
He may have some characteristics of a Christian. He may look like
a Christian. He may talk like a Christian.
He may go to church and be very punctual in his religious habits,
but he cannot be a Christian and actually, literally hate
a man. He can't do it. No way. Does not the Scripture say that
we are to Love our neighbors as ourselves. He's not saying here that we're
to hate. It's our duty to quarrel with our mother and father and
our wife and our brother and hate them. That's not what he's
saying. Only a monster would hate his mother and father, wouldn't
he? Only a monster would hate his wife who's loved him and
bore his children and who waits on him hand and foot day in and
day out. Only a monster would do that. Someone said, A man
loves his wife too much. Hold on. No, he can't. No, he
can't. You can't love your wife too
much. Your wife's a picture. She's a picture of the church
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And our Lord said, through the
Apostle Paul, says, Husbands, love your wives even as Christ
loved the church and gave Himself for it. You can't love your wives
too much. Don't you worry about that. Some of you women, Maybe you're worried a little
bit about it, but you men, you don't love your wife too much.
You can't shower and bestow enough affection upon her. No, sir. You can't love your
children too much. No, sir. You can't love one another
too much. You can't love your pastor too
much. And the pastor can't love his
people too much. It doesn't mean here when it
says, If any man come after me, he's to quarrel and hate, and
one of the characteristics of being a Christian is that he
hates his father. A man's a monster that hates his daddy, and his
mother, and his wife, and his children. It doesn't mean that
at all. Because if that's the intention and purpose of this
scripture, it contradicts everything else in the Bible. And we know
that our Lord didn't mean to contradict other scriptures.
He did not mean us to understand that it's the duty of a Christian
to hate his kinsmen or his kinfolk. He meant that those that follow
him must love him with a deeper love than even their closest
relative or kinsman. It meant that I'm to love him
with a love that is deeper and greater than a love that I have
to my wife, or to my children, or to my mother, or to my father,
or to you, or to myself. A deeper and greater love for
Him. That's what He's talking about.
You see, He demands all. Our Lord will not come off second
best in this matter. He claims all of us. He who gave
Himself in our stead and place and room, who offered Himself
unreservedly, He offered Himself on the altar of sacrifice, and
God poured out His wrath upon the Lord Jesus Christ as a substitute. Ask of us that we give our all
to Him. He demands our love. And if need be, if need be, we're
to love our God and our Savior more than we are to love mother
and father and brother and sister. That's what he means. He meant that the claims of men's
kinsmen and the claims of the Lord Jesus, if they ever came
into conflict or into collision, that the claims of the kinsmen
or the relatives must yield to the claims of the Lord Jesus. That's what he means. He means
that we must choose if need be, to displease our kinsmen rather
than to displease the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what he means.
He means that we must be willing to offend our family rather than
to offend the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you see what I'm saying? He's
asking for everything. He's asking for everything. Someone
was telling me here the other day about, said, well, a fellow was talking to me about
religion of some sort, but I remember him saying this, don't remember
where it was at, but they said this, they said, well, I do think
that the Bible teaches that you ought to give 10% of what you
got. I said, well, I said, I don't think it teaches that at all.
He said, well, what do you mean? He said, don't you believe that
you're to give a tithe? I said, I believe that the Lord
God Almighty does not own 10% of a man, but He owns 100% of
him. He owns him all, not just 10%. He owns everything. Lock, stock,
and barrel. He owns him from the bottom of
his feet to the top of his head. He owns everything that he is,
everything that he has, everything that he hopes to be. He owns
him now. And he owns him tomorrow, and
he owns him a year from now. He owns him. He bought him! He
bought him! He paid the price for him! He
bought him! It's cheap! Long time! It's like I bought
a dog one time for ten dollars. Fella said, come see that dog.
I said, will he run a rabbit? He said, yes, he'll run a rabbit.
I said, well, I said, I might buy him off of you. If I can
get a hold of ten dollars. If he'll run a rabbit. Come down,
he said, some evening, let's try him out. So I went down next
to Morgantown. We took that dog, old Blackie. Took old Blackie out there in
the field, in the woods, and the first thing you know, boy,
he got up a rabbit. Bringing him right around. I
said, how much you want for that dog? He said, ten dollars. I
gave him ten dollars. That's my dog. I mean that was
my dog from then until the day he died, that was my dog! I paid
the price for that dog and he was mine! And I could leave him
on the porch if I wanted to, or I could take him out and put
him in the pen, or I could refuse to hunt him, refuse to lend him,
I could do with that dog as it pleased me because he is my dog! Maybe no one else liked him,
but I didn't make any difference, he was mine. I paid for him,
my dog. Our Lord Jesus Christ paid the
price that the justice and holiness of God demanded against sin. Paid the price. Set us free. We belong to him. Not a drop
of blood that runs in the veins of your body that doesn't belong
to the Lord Jesus Christ. He bought it. God hath turned
over this world to him. He owns the crown and rights
of every soul, the Lord Jesus. He said, if any man be my disciple,
if need be, if need be, if there's a conflict between your family,
your wife, your brothers, your sisters, or your neighbors, or
anybody else, or anything else, if there's any conflict between
the claims of the Lord Jesus Christ, And the claims of your
loved ones, if they run into a collision there, he said, then
the claims of your loved ones has got to yield to the claims
of mine. Because I'm number one. I'm number
one. I'm Lord over all. And He's Lord
over all, or He will not be Lord at all. He's Lord. Well, you see, the second thing,
Well, let me say this before I say the second thing. Now,
it's a heavy cross. This is a heavy burden. It's
a heavy weight. It's a heavy weight. It's a heavy cross to
disagree with those that we love, especially about spiritual things. But if need be, we've got to
do it. Secondly, the thing that we learn
here is this, that those who are thinking about following
the Lord Jesus Christ, should be warned to consider what they're
becoming involved in. That is, to count the cost. There's a price that they're
going to have to pay. And he wants them to know, would
you be willing, if called upon, to pay this price? You may be
called upon to pay a price. Are you willing? I want you to
know what you're getting involved in. that this is a war that you're
entering into. It talks about if a man would
be a what? A good soldier of Jesus Christ. He must not be entangled with
the affairs of this world or the affairs of this life. It
can't be because his loyalty will be divided. That's the way
when a man goes to the army. They pay everything for Him.
They want Him to do a job for them. They've trained Him to
do a job and they want Him to produce. He can't produce. He
can't do what they require of Him, what they desire of Him.
He can't do a good job if He's all the time moaning and moaning
and carrying on, oh my babies, oh my babies. We had a fellow
one time when I was in the service, He left the United States and
went down through the Panama Canal. This old fella's from
Kentucky. Can't think of his name now. But, oh, he got down
there in Panama and he told me, he said, he said, can I borrow
your coat? And I said, yeah, you can borrow
it. He borrowed my coat. It's the last I ever seen of
it. But, anyhow, he sold it. Anyhow, he told me before he
left, he said, oh, my babies. Oh, he said, here we are down
along the Panama Canal. We're going to go through the
Panama Canal and we're going out into the Pacific Ocean. And he
said, we're gone! He said, McNair, come back here,
where are my babies? Where are my babies? Well, he
couldn't stay. He left. I've never seen him
again. I don't know whether he, maybe he's still down there in
Panama. He never did come back. First time, the first line, we
started up to the dock. First line that hit the dock
out there where he was with it. He's still going. You see what
I'm talking about? The second thing we see here
is that those who are thinking about following Christ should
be warned to count the cost. What are you getting involved
in? You see, brethren, you know it and I know it, there's a whole
lot of people that make professions without thought and without consideration. They don't give it no thought.
They don't think about it. They don't consider what they become
involved in. You see, it costs something to
be a true disciple of the Lord Jesus. If all there is to it
to be a disciple of the Lord Jesus is to go to church on Sunday
morning, once in a while on Wednesday night, and give, even if we're
talking about 10% of your income, and live a respectable life,
if that's all there is to it, that's a cheap and easy discipleship. If that's all there is to it.
Go to church. Give 10%. Appear to be respectable. That's cheap and easy. That's
not what he's talking about. No, sir. Listen. I'll tell you
this. a true disciple. And what our
Lord is talking about is this. It is to hear his voice. For
a man to actually hear, my sheep hear my voice. is to hear His
voice and secondly is to follow Him. Follow the Lord Jesus. Not the Jesus that you heard
about in Sunday school and you wouldn't recognize the Jesus
that you heard about in Sunday school if you took the Bible
and tried to find the Jesus of the Bible. I'm not talking about
that Jesus over there. I'm talking about the Jesus of
the Bible. I'm talking about the Lord Jesus Christ. Hear His voice. Follow Him. Follow the Lord Jesus Christ. Not this Lord Jesus that He wants
to do something but He can't do it. Not the God who's trying. He's trying. He's trying to get
this whole world straightened up. He's got a lot of problems
in this world. We've got war in the Middle East
and we've got a Reaganomics or a bad economy here in the United
States and we've got The unemployment is 13 or 14 percent and it's
this and it's that and we just got crime on the streets and
we got pornography and we got this and we got that and we got
all kinds of trouble. Oh, look like God to do something
about all this. I'm not talking about that kind
of a God that wants to do something but can't do something. I'm talking
about a God. who can do exactly as he purposes
to do when he wants to do it. He could put crime down. He could take care of the drug
problem. He could take care of the recession
in the snap of his fingers. I'm talking about following the
Jesus as revealed in the Bible. hear His voice, and follow Him,
and believe in Him, and confess Him. And this requires a little
bit of self-denial. This will cost you something.
It will cost you. When grace first enters into
a household, you'll find out what our Savior means when He
says, a man's greatest foes are those of his own household. You
let the grace of God enter into a household through a young man
or a woman or an old man or an old woman. Let the rest of the
family say, well, oh no, he's religious. He's awful. He's a
fanatic. He's crazy. He's crazy. Now we let him go. We pamper
him as much as we can. We just go on and don't pay too
much attention to him. But they become hostile eventually
towards him when grace I tell you, it takes some determination
for a young man or woman to announce to their mother, well, by the
grace of God, the Spirit of God saved me last night. I went to
church and I heard the preacher, and the preacher preached with
power. And the Word of God, the Word
of God just pricked my heart and rendered me impotent and
helpless. and undone before the King of
glory. And I see my nothingness and
my unworthiness before God, and I felt the guilt of sin in my
heart against God. But the Spirit of God that convicted
me of my condition revealed unto me the loveliness of the Savior,
the Lord Jesus, down in my stead. I embraced Him, and I heard Him
say, Thy sins be forgiven thee. And when you tell that to a family
that there's no grace in that household, they'll say, well,
now, that's not the church you go to. That's not the church
of your grandfather. That's not the church of your
grandmother. That's not the church of your mother and your father.
No, you can't do that. Isn't that what they say? Oh,
no. Oh, no. You've got to make a
choice. You see, it'll cost you something.
Self-denial costs you something. There's few of any that knows
anything about self-denial, denying themselves. Boy, but I'll tell
you, we've got to. We've got to count the cost.
It's to hear His voice, it's to follow Him, it's to believe
in Him, it's to confess Him, and this requires some self-denial. It'll cost us our sins, it'll
cost us our self-righteousness, it'll cost us our pride, it'll
cost us our ease, it'll cost us our worldliness. All must
be given up for Jesus' sake. He bids us, see that second point
is, he bids us to count the cost. Did he mean here to make the
gate of life appear more narrow than it is? Did He wish to discourage
men from following Him? Is that the idea? No, sir. That's
not the desire and the purpose or the wishes of the Lord Jesus
Christ. No, He meant to prevent men from
taking Him lightly. That's what He meant. You see,
the Jesus that's preached nowadays, men take Him lightly. They say,
take Jesus! Try it! I was at the hospital here this
afternoon. As I drove up, there was a man got out of his car,
and I couldn't help seeing his license, or seeing his car, and
on the bumper of his car said, Try Jesus. Why don't you try
Jesus? Can you try Jesus? Can a man
take Jesus and try Jesus? Listen, if you can take Jesus,
if Jesus is so little, and so puny, and insignificant, and
so devoid of power, that you can take Him, and I can take
Him, a puny, weak, worthless, worm of the dust, if He's so
little that I can take Him, He couldn't do me much good if I
had Him. If He's that small. Take Jesus. Jesus Christ is on
the right hand of God, how are you going to take Him? How are
you going to take this Jesus who is King and Lord over all,
and you are in His hands? And He can do what you are pleased
with, how are you going to take Him? What arm then? Is your arm so strong that you
can force your way into the presence of God and take God's Son who
is on a throne? Take Jesus. Will you try Jesus? If you don't
like this suit of clothes, why try another one? If you don't
like ketchup, try mustard. If you don't like a Chevrolet,
try a Ford. That's what they're saying. Try Jesus, why don't
you? You're doing this, why don't
you try Jesus? Put him on like a new shoe. If he fits, well,
maybe you might like it. Try him. That's not what I'm
talking about. That's not what the Bible's talking
about. They don't try the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh no. You bow to Him. When you come
into the presence of the King, you don't come skipping in, or
whistling, snapping your bubble gum. I went to a camp meeting
one time down in Suffolk, Virginia. Great big camp. Preachers preaching. I was sitting up there pretty
close to the preacher. And he was landed on. And here comes
some kid down, a little girl, a big one, come down the middle
of the alley eating ice cream cone, just laughing and joking
and all. And here comes another, and she's
just popping her bubble gum, just snapping it and making big
bubbles. Oh, they're having a big time. Turn to the presence of
the King! And when it was over with, the
preacher, no, the preacher, while he was preaching, he scolded
him! He said, Don't be so irreverent. He said, Mother, get that child
and set her down. And when we left there that night,
I was with the preacher, stayed with him at his home. We left
there that night while the woman, the grandmother of that child,
come to the preacher. Oh, I'm telling you, she laid
him out. She said, You might have worked that child's personality
for the rest of his life. He better not have come to Jesus.
didn't bother the preacher any. Oh, no. I wish these soul winners,
these altar benches and these decision makers, I wish they'd
leave the salvation of a sinner up to God. I wish they'd leave
God-safe sinners and quit saving themselves. Wouldn't have so
many of these fallen-away businesses. Would leave God to do the work.
Oh, my. Listen. He meant here to prevent
men from taking him lightly. Look upon him lightly as someone
looks upon me. I went to the hospital this morning,
or this afternoon, and the lady in the sickbed there said, well,
I'm glad you're looking good. You look like you've come out
of this operation. I'm glad. I'm glad. She said,
I'm feeling a little better. I said, well, that's good. It'll
be a few days, and I trust you'll be better. There's a lady there
with her, and she said, this is my neighbor. I said, this
is Reverend Richardson. She said, are you a reverend?
I said, well, I'm the pastor of the church. I said, nothing
reverend about me. I said, I'm not any more reverend than you
are. And I hated to say that because I didn't want to offend
her. I don't think I offended her. I said it in a nice way.
And I said, well, I'm not a reverend. I said, I'm the pastor of the
church, and I do the preaching. But I said, the Bible only mentions
the word reverend one time in the whole Bible, one time, and
it says reverend and holy is his name. I said, that reverend,
that adjective that describes the character of God says reverend
and holy is his name! And I said, I don't think we
ought to put that to our names. Oh, she said. Taking Jesus lightly. He meant
to prevent men from taking Jesus' life. He meant to keep men from following
a mere animal temptation, or animal feeling, or temporary
excitement, who, when in the time of temptation or in the
time of trouble, would fall away and renounce their profession.
He knew that nothing does as much harm to the cause of the
Lord Jesus Christ than for a man to start and not finish. That does more harm. For a man
to make a profession of faith and say, yes, I'm going. He's mine and I'm his. I love
you and I love the Word. I love these brethren. God, help
me. Pray for me. I'm going all the
way, and then about six months later, hard times fall on that
fella. Temptation comes, burdens come,
difficulties come, family trouble, maybe lose his job, maybe a temper
gets the best of him or something, he cusses somebody out, and the
first thing you know he says, well I quit. Man, I couldn't
make it, I don't know why I started. And he goes back to where I was
before. That causes more problems and
shame and trial and trouble on the cause of the Lord Jesus Christ
than anything else. See, what we need to do, if we
don't at the beginning let men know what's involved in being
a true disciple, well, if we don't, we'll just swell the number.
of those that have already fallen away. Count the cost before you
start. It's a whole lifetime, I've told
you that. It's not starting, but it's also
finishing. So many are built up in self-deception
and encouraged to think that they're converted, when in reality
they're not converted. We ought not to hide from them
the war that's out there and what's required of them. We ought
to tell them. about the battle and the toil. We ought to tell
men, come, come with us! But count the cost before you
come, you see. Well, I'll quit. The last thing
that we can see in this particular portion of Scripture is this,
how miserable the condition of those who start, but fall by
the way. How terrible their end is. He
describes them, and I read it to you. He describes men who
start, but don't finish. They get tired of the way. He
describes them, and he's describing it. He says that they're like
salt. He said, salt is good. Salt is
good. It's good. He said in another
place, he said, you're the salt of the earth. That's what he
said. He said, but you're the salt of the earth. You're good. You're the salt of the earth.
But he said, if the salt has lost its savor, it's no good. It's no good. And so he says,
those that start and then fall by the way and renounce their
beginning, he said, they're like salt which has lost its savor.
They're useless. They're useless. I hate to say
that, but it's right. He held up his hand to the Lord
and said, I believe. And he's done it voluntarily.
No one's twisted his arm. He said, I believe. He said,
to establish my belief. And to show you the strength
of it, he said, I submit to holy baptism. And he goes down and
he's baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus and said he's
died to sin. And God's raised him to walk
in the newness of life. And he said, I can't go back!
I can't go back! And then when he does go back,
when he does go back, that salt has lost its savor and that salt
is useless. And that fellow that held up
his hand, And that fella that got offended, and that fella
that fell out, and this and that, and went back! He went back!
Listen to me! Our Lord said he's useless! Useless! Not fit for the land! Not fit
to put on the land, that's all it is! Not fit to put on the
downhill! A man, you see, a man that starts, a man that starts
and then apostatizes! You can't tell that man anything
that he doesn't know! You can't show him a doctrine
that he hasn't heard. He's heard all of this. What
makes it so bad is this. He's different from the vast
multitude of people. They haven't heard it. This man has walked
away with his eyes wide open. That makes it bad. He walks away
with his eyes open. That makes it bad. And when he
does, when he does, Scripture says, useless, useless. That's
the condition, useless. What am I saying? I'm saying
what you used to talk about, when is a man a disciple until
we find out what a disciple is? This is what a disciple is. What
is coming to Christ is total commitment, body, soul, and spirit.
How long, preacher? All your life. You don't listen
for four years. You're not in for the duration.
Now, you won't get a 30-day leave at the end of the year when you
come home. No, when you enlist in this army, it's forever. It's
once and for all. What are you in the family of
God? Well, God help us. God help us. In Jesus' name,
God help us.