1 Corinthians chapter 11. Paul
says to the church at Corinth in verse 1, Be ye followers of
me, even as I also am. of Christ. Now, I want to attempt
to preach upon this subject, followers of Christ. You know, I love to read about
Matthew sitting there at the receipt of custom. He was a publican,
minding his own business. I don't suppose he had any interest
in the gospel at all. Christ comes through and says
to him in almighty, invincible, irresistible grace. Follow me. And the Scripture
says, He arose and pursued everything and followed the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's my prayer that a duplication
of that will take place in every one of our hearts that we'll
hear him say to us, follow me. And we will, just like Matthew,
rise up, forsake everything and follow him. Now, if I'm not deceiving
myself, what I want more than anything else in this life is
to be a follower of Jesus Christ. I want that more than anything. I want to be a true out-and-out
disciple, a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. People are ambitious
about being leaders, aren't they? Everybody wants to be a leader. We want our kids to be leaders,
not followers, but leaders. There are all kinds of leadership seminars
and things of that nature. But here is where we really ought
to be ambitious. That is to be a follower. A follower of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now His word to you and His word
to me is follow Oh, that he would speak that
in power to our hearts even now. I've got to have him. I tell
you what, it takes his grace to cause us to hear that word.
I love to think of Matthew sitting there, just sitting there minding
his own business. I don't think he had a bit of
interest in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, maybe
he heard some of course, he heard something that stirred up his
interest and so on. But there he is. The scripture just points
out all he's doing sitting there at the receipt of customs, a
corrupt man, a publican making money through unjust gains. And
the Lord says to him, follow thou me. And he got up and he
forsook his entire way of life and he followed. He became an
out-and-out disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what
a disciple of Christ is. He's one who follows the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now, think a bit about following. Just the concept of following
somebody. You've all followed somebody
before. We follow someone physically
with our senses. We follow by sight. We see them. We see the direction they're
going. We see where they're at. And we follow them by looking
at them. We follow by sight, but we also
follow by hearing, don't we? Have you ever followed a voice,
followed a sound? You hear the sound and you go
in the direction of the sound. We follow by hearing. We follow
by sense of smell. Have you ever smelled something
in another room and you like what you smell? I mean, you just
went in that direction of that smell. You were drawn to it.
You know, we follow by feeling, by touch. I'm in a habit. That driveway from here to the
mailbox out there is 150 yards. And I have a habit of when I'm
going out that driveway, I close my eyes and see how far I can
walk without opening them. It's kind of scary. I close them
and I start walking and walking. I do that all the time. I know
that's strange, but I do it. But I can tell when I veer off,
I can feel When I get to grass and I'm off the driveway, I know
it's time to get back on. But you can follow simply by
feeling something and touching. You can recognize something by
taste. We follow through the senses,
don't we? And we follow the Lord Jesus
Christ through spiritual senses. Faith is how we see. We see the
Lord Jesus Christ as our all in salvation. We see that. We
have some understanding of that. We hear the voice of His Word. We hear what He says in His Word
and we bow down to it. We smell His sweet savor. We taste that He is gracious. We follow the Lord Jesus Christ
by our spiritual senses, and only a believer can do that.
An unbeliever doesn't have any spiritual senses. He's dead in
trespasses and sins, but when God saves you, He gives you a
new heart. He gives you a nature that has
the capacity to be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
I repeat once again, this is what I want for myself more than
anything else. It's not to be anything but an
out-and-out follower of Jesus Christ. That's it. That's my
highest ambition. Now, we're not born followers
of Christ. Let me read you a passage of Scripture from Isaiah, chapter
53, verse 6. It says, All we like sheep have
gone astray. Not following Him, but leaving
Him. All we like sheep have gone astray.
We've turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid
upon him the iniquity of us all. We're not born followers, but
we become followers. Turn with me to 1 Thessalonians
chapter 1, verse 4. Paul says to the church at Thessalonica,
knowing, brethren beloved, your election of God. Now, Paul, how in the world can
you know their election? Do you have privy into the Lamb's
Book of Life where you can crawl up into heaven and see whose
names are written there? Now, there is a Lamb's Book of
Life. God's elect. God chose who would be saved
before time began. They will be saying, but how
can you look at somebody, Paul, and know their election of God?
Look what he goes on to say. Four, our gospel came not unto
you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Ghost. And in much assurance you knew
this is the truth of God, as you knew what manner of men we
were among you for your sakes. And you became followers of us
and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction with
the joy of the Holy Ghost, so that you were examples. You followed
us to the point where folks could follow you also. You became examples
where they could follow in your steps. Now Paul said, that's
how I know your election of God. You became followers, actual
disciples, adherents of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, following
Christ is what all of God's people do. Turn to John chapter 10. We looked at this scripture this
morning, but it bears looking at again. Verse 24, Then came
the Jews round about him, and said unto him, How long dost
thou make us to doubt? If thou be the Christ, tell us
plainly. Jesus answered, I told you, and you believe not. The
works that I do in my Father's name, they bear witness of me.
But you believe not, because you are not of my sheep, as I
said unto you. Now notice, he doesn't say, You
are not my sheep, because you don't believe. He says, You believe
not, because you are not of my sheep. You are not of my elect.
You are not of my people. Now look what he says about his
sheep. In verse 27, he says, My sheep, Hear my voice. I have never heard the voice
of Jesus Christ audibly. But I've heard it a whole lot
louder than that. And I've heard it a whole lot
more powerfully than that. I hear His voice. I know that this book is his
word, and I know it's his word. I hear his voice. I hear his
gospel. He says, my sheep hear my voice
and I know them. You know, when I'm when I'm talking
about the Lord, I'm not name dropping. He'd say regarding
me, and this is true of every one of these people, I can say
I know him. Anybody can say that, but he'd also say I know him.
I know him. He's one of mine. I know him
as one of my people, one of my believers. I know them and they
follow me. Are there any exceptions to this
rule? Absolutely not. Every single one of them follow
me. And this path we follow along
and follow the Lord Jesus Christ is not a dark path. It's a path
of light. It's not in darkness that we
follow Him. John 8, 32 says, He that followeth me shall not
walk in darkness, but he'll have the light of life. Now, this
thing of following the Lord Jesus Christ, it's a light. In following
Him, I've got light as to why I ought to do it. I've got light
to understand that this is the only thing to do. I've got light
to know that I'm going to be enabled to follow Him. and to
be just like Matthew, to forsake all and follow Him. I've got
light from the Gospel. You see, I've got light as to
why He'd save me in the first place. I've got light as to why
He'd love me in the first place. I've got light as to why He would
accept me in the first place. I love that song you just sang
where He said He pled. He was talking about the intercession
of Christ. I can't remember exactly how the line went, but it says
He pleads only His blood. Boy, that just struck a chord
with me. He pleads for me. I've got some life here. This
is not a dark path. I know where I'm going. I know
who I'm following. I know his voice. It's not a
dark path. It's not some kind of mystical
something or other. It's something we can enter into.
I'm following the Lord Jesus Christ. And following him takes
precedence over everything and everybody. And that's the only
way he can be followed. Turn with me to Matthew chapter
10. Verse 37, He that loveth father or mother
more than me is not worthy of me. And he that loveth son or
daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And He that taketh not his cross
and followeth after me is not worthy of me. He that findeth
his life, what's he going to do? He's going to lose it. He
that seeks his own life in his own way, what's going to happen?
He's going to lose it. He that lose his life for my sake shall
find it. Now, that's the only way to follow
the Lord Jesus Christ. There is no other way. Following
Christ is imitating Christ. Peter put it this way in 1 Peter
2, verse 21, For even here unto where ye called, because Christ
also suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should
follow in his stance. Here is where imitation is superior
to originality. simply to follow in his steps. Following Christ is not easy. Matter of fact, it's impossible
apart from the grace of God. It's certainly not easy. Let
me show you a scripture that will speak of this. In Luke 5, verses 27 and 28,
I want us to see what Matthew did, or Levi, Matthew, the same
person, what he did in following the Lord Jesus Christ. And after these things, he went
forth, verse 27, Luke 5, verse 27. And after these things, he
went forth and saw a publican named Levi. setting at the receipt
of custom, and he said unto him, Follow me. And he left all, rose up and followed him. He left all. You see that this is not in any
way easy. to follow the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, there are people who claim to follow Him in an easy way.
Turn with me to Luke 9. You're there in Luke. I want
you to see this. Luke chapter 9, verse 57. And it came to pass that as they
went in the way, a certain man said unto him, Lord, I will follow
thee whithersoever thou goest. What do you think about that
when you read that passage of scripture? Lord, I will follow thee wherever
you're going. It doesn't matter where it is.
I'm going to follow you. And the first thing I've noticed
is the Lord didn't initiate this. The Lord didn't say, follow me,
and then he said, no. He initiated it himself. And
you know what else I noticed about it? I noticed great pride. and great arrogance and great
self-sufficiency. Lord, I will. The essence of sin. Lord, I will
follow thee whithersoever thou goest. Now, if you know yourself
at all. Now, I can say this to every
believer, every believer in this room. Lord, give me grace to follow
I know I won't do it unless you enable me. I know I'll go off
and go astray and I'll go in every bad direction and do every
wrong thing and believe. Lord, give me grace to follow
you. You don't make some kind of...
Lord, I will follow thee whether soever thou goest. Now look how
the Lord replies to this fellow. Verse 58, Jesus said unto him,
Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son
of Man hath nowhere to lay his head. Now evidently this man
thought there was going to be some kind of game. in him following
the Lord Jesus Christ. Somehow it's going to heal my
finances. It's going to heal my marriage.
It's going to make things better for me. And the Lord said, I don't
even have a place to call home. You know, the Lord was a street
person. You know, you're going to go
home tonight and you're going to get in your bed and thank God for it.
You've got a home to go to, a nice place to go to. I'm thankful
for that. I praise the Lord that I've got a house. And air conditioning,
I'm so thankful for that. But you know, the Lord didn't
have that. He went out and slept out under the stars. He didn't
have a home the way you and I do. He said the son of man doesn't
even have a place to lay his head. Evidently, this fellow
was following him for the wrong reason. Now, look at verse 59. And he saith unto another. Now,
this is better. The Lord initiates this. He saith
unto another, follow me. But he said, Lord, suffer me
first to go and bury my father. Suffer me first, let this happen
first." What was the Lord's response to that? Jesus said unto him,
you let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom
of God. You let dead people deal with
what dead people do. Just let them at it, but you
go and preach the kingdom of God. Verse 61, and another said,
Lord, I will follow thee. He initiated it again. The Lord
doesn't say to him, follow me. But maybe he was listening in
to all this. He said, Lord, I'll follow thee, but let me first
go bid them farewell, which are at home, at my house. And Jesus
said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plow, looking
back, is fit for the kingdom of God. You see, this thing of
following Christ, nothing can come before it. Turn to Matthew
16. Verse 24. Then said Jesus unto
his disciples, Matthew 16, 24, If any man will come after me,
let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow
me. Now, there is no, listen real
carefully, there is no following of Christ without this. I am
called upon, first of all, to deny myself. Do you all know any selfish people?
Do you know any people that are real self-focused, egocentric,
self-seeking, selfish? Self-centered. Boys, it's hard
to be around people like that, isn't it? I mean, you're irritating. The reality is. That every one
of us are just like that. Some show it more, some are more
obvious, some are more, you know, it just comes out. But every
one of us have that self. Self-ish. That's a remarkable
word, isn't it? Self-ish. Self-centered. Self-righteous. Self-seeking. The greatest problem that you
have, the greatest enemy that you have is yourself. Do you
believe that? What is a believer called upon
to do? To deny self. That ain't easy, is it? As a
matter of fact, it's impossible apart from the grace of God.
But deny self, I must do. Put down self. Take up my cross. Now, when he's talking about
taking up the cross, he's not talking about, well, it's my
cross to bear. I'm sick. I got one leg hurt me bad, or
I've got cancer, or I've got a bad marriage, or I've got financial
problems, and that's the cross I've got to bear. That has nothing
to do with what the Lord is saying. When he's talking about taking
up your cross, He's talking about taking up that confession of
Christ, that confession of salvation by the cross of the Lord Jesus
Christ, that confession of the Christ that will bring upon the
hostility and the hatred of the world. If I'm winning a popularity
contest in this world by my preaching, I'm obviously not preaching the
gospel. If people love what I'm saying, Natural men. I'm obviously
not preaching the gospel. He says we're to take up our
cross, that confession of salvation by Christ. Here's the best way I know how
to put this. When he bowed his head from the cross and said,
it is finished, that means the salvation of all of God's elect
was finished. accomplished. Now, if somebody's
hoping something other than that, they're not going to like it,
are they? They're going to get upset. So be it. I'm still to
take up my cross, to deny myself, and to follow the Lord Jesus
Christ. And we can't follow Him without
denying ourself and taking up our cross. Look what it says
in verse 25. For whosoever will save his life He shies away from
denying himself, taking up his cross and following the Lord
Jesus Christ. It would cramp his style. It would mess up his
plans. It would mess up his ambitions.
Whosoever will save his life shall lose it. And whosoever
will lose his life for my sake shall find it. Look up in verse
21 of this same chapter. From that time forth began Jesus
to show his disciples how that he must go into Jerusalem and
suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes
and be killed and be raised again the third day. Then Peter took
him and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee,
Lord. This shall not be unto thee.
And my margin says, Pity thyself. Have mercy on yourself. Don't
take this direction. I mean, be this far from you.
Pity yourself. Now, what would have happened
to me and you if the Lord pitied Himself? We wouldn't have been saved,
would we? We see that following Christ
is certainly not easy. It's impossible without Him enabling
us to do it. But even in light of the difficulty,
I still want to follow Him and walk with Him along this narrow
way, don't you? Turn to John chapter 12. This is repeated so often in
the Scripture, much along the same line. Look in verse 25.
John chapter 12, verse 25. He that loveth his life. He's going to lose it. He that
hates his life in this world shall keep it unto eternal life. Now, if any man serve me, let
him follow me. And where I am, there shall my
servant be. If any man serve me, him will
my Father honor." Now, in that verse of Scripture, I see three
great blessings in following the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, when
we talk about following, it's hard. I mean, we see that what's called
upon us to deny self, to take up our cross, to follow Him.
Nothing easy about this. It's impossible apart from the
grace of God. Well, why would I want to do it if it's so difficult?
Well, first, in following the Lord Jesus Christ, I'm actually
serving Him. I don't care if He says, follow
me through hell. I'm to do it. And in doing that,
I'm serving Him. And the only The place I get
any peace and joy and satisfaction is serving Him. Secondly, He
says, and I like this, in verse 26, If any man serve Me, let
him follow Me, and where I am, there shall also My servant be. Now, here's a great advantage
to following the Lord Jesus Christ. When I'm following Him, wherever
He is, that's where I am, and that's where I want to be. I
want to be in His presence. I want to know His hand is upon
me. And He says, whoever follows
Me, they're right there with Me. That's where I want to be.
I want to be with the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm with Him. That could be my plea on Judgment
Day. When I stand before God, I'm looking to Him to answer.
I'm with Him. I'm looking to Him. There's a great blessing
in following the Lord Jesus Christ. You're with him. And what's he
say next? If any man serve me, him will
my father honor. What could possibly be better
than those three things being honored by the father? While there's difficulty in following
Christ, there is great reward. And in following Christ, understand
this, we can't pick and choose where we follow. I love that
scripture in Revelation 14 chapter 4. It describes all of God's
elect. It says, These are they which follow the Lamb, whether
so ever he goeth. Don't you want that to be the
description of you? Somebody who follows the Lamb
wherever he goes. Now let me make a couple more
comments about following Christ. In following him, I'm not to
worry about how you follow him. Let me show you this in scripture.
We are there in John. Turn to John chapter 21. Beginning
in verse 18. The Lord is talking to Peter,
and he says, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast
young, you girded yourself and walked wherever you wanted to
go. But when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy
hand, and another shall gird thee and carry thee, whether
thou wouldest not. This spake he signifying by what
death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this,
he saith unto him, Follow me. Now, you think of what's being
said. Lord's telling Peter, and this is what they said, whether
it sounds to me like he's going to be crucified. And that's what
I've heard. That's what church tradition says. He was crucified
upside down. I don't know whether that's so,
but they said he didn't feel like he deserved to be crucified
the same way the Lord was. So he had to turn him upside
down when he was crucified. Whether that's true, I don't
know. But the Lord was speaking of his death. He told him by
what death he would glorify God. And look at Peter's response.
Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved
following, which also leaned on his breast at supper, and
said, Lord, which is he that betrayeth thee? Peter, seeing
him, saith the Lord, Lord, and what should this man do? What's
he going to have to do? I mean, here you tell me I'm
going to have to be crucified or killed. What about him? And look
at the Lord's answer. Jesus saith unto him, If I will
that he tarry till I come, What is that to thee? What business
is that of yours? You follow me. Now, when I'm talking about following
Christ, if you think, man, I hope so-and-so hears that, you missed
it. What is that to you? It's none
of your business how anybody else follows Christ or what he
calls upon him to do. You're to think only about yourself. What is that to be? Follow thou
me. First Corinthians one. This is actually what. First
Corinthians 11, I'm sorry, this is what inspired this message
thinking about this. statement Paul makes to the Church
of Corinth. He says, be ye followers, chapter
11, verse 1, be ye followers of me even as I also am of Christ. Now, look what he had been saying
to them previously. Look up at verse 31 of chapter
10, wherefore, therefore, whether therefore you eat or drink or
whatsoever you do. Do all to the glory of God. Give
none offense neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the
Church of God, even as I please all men in all things, not seeking
my own profit and benefit, but the profit of many, that they
may be saved. May you be followers of me."
You do the same thing. In Matthew chapter 4, verse 19,
when the Lord called Peter and John, He said, Follow me. and I will
make you fishers of men. Now, if you follow the Lord Jesus
Christ, somebody, I guarantee you, is going to follow you following
Him. They're going to imitate you.
Be ye followers of me, as I also am of Christ. Awesome thing to think about.
You follow Christ, somebody is going to follow you following
Him every time. Hence the importance of following
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now may this be what is conspicuous
in our lives. Being followers. Out-and-out
disciples. I mean nothing held back. Disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. Where our steps lead, no doubt,
we are imitators of Him. Now turn with me to one other
scripture, Acts chapter 4. Verse 13, Now when they saw the boldness
of Peter and John, and how bold they were in preaching the gospel,
and they perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men,
they didn't have anything going for them, humanly speaking. They
were unlearned and ignorant men. I love this. They took knowledge
of them that they had been with Jesus. I want that said about me, and
I want that said about you. They took knowledge of them,
that they'd been with the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, following
Christ. Don't you want to follow Christ?
I find this so challenging. I want to follow His every step. And how very grateful I am that He follows me. He's before me. He's behind me. And my following of Him is not
what causes my salvation. His shed blood for me is what
causes my salvation. And my following Him is a result
of my gratefulness to Him. and my thankfulness to Him for
taking my sin and causing it to become His, and suffering
untold, unimagined agony on the cross. and putting away my sin
to where it's no more, taking His perfect obedience and making
it mine, so I stand without guilt before God. I stand without sin
before God. I stand perfect before God. You
know what that makes me want to do? It makes me want to follow
Jesus Christ. That's my ambition. That's what
I want more than anything else. Now, what we're going to do right
now is we're going to observe the Lord's table. Who should drink the wine? Who should eat the bread? Everybody who believes the gospel. I got a letter from somebody
this week, and they were asking about how we observe the Lord's
table, what we thought about it, and they made this statement.
Can people take the Lord's Table as long as they're, as long as
they have an obedient walk? What's that got to do with taking
the Lord's Table? If you have an obedient walk,
you don't need the Lord's Table, do you? You don't need His precious
blood. Now, I'm not, I'm not making
it in any way, giving somebody an out for disobedience, but
when we take the Lord's Table, here's what we're saying. We're
showing forth the Lord's death till he come. We're saying his
death is my life before God. The reason I can be accepted
by God is his broken body and his shed blood. And we celebrate. It's a celebration. When you
take that bread in your mouth, may God give you grace, may He
give me grace to do it in remembrance of Him, remembering the agony
He suffered, how He really became sin. My sin actually became His. He suffered the wrath of God.
When we chew that bread, we think of Him being crushed and ground
under the wrath of God. When we take the wine, it signifies
His blood. We're thinking about the forgiveness
and the complete salvation He actually accomplished. When we
drink that wine, we're remembering, my sin's been put away by what
He did. Can you do anything less than
praise the Lord for that? This do as oft as ye do it in
remembrance of me. Who should take the Lord's table?
Everybody who trusts Him only. And if you don't trust Him only,
you're drinking to yourself damnation if you take up the Lord's table.
It's only those who believe, but it's everybody who believes.
Let me remind you this. I used to, as a young believer,
I used to dread the Lord's table. Because I think about that scripture,
Whoso drinketh unworthily and eateth unworthily, He's guilty
of the body and blood of the Lord, and I'd just be scared
to do it, because I thought, well, I'm no doubt doing it unworthily. I didn't understand the Lord's
Table. But when I understand that I am utterly unworthy, and
He is my worthiness before God, then I am worthy to take of the
Lord's Table. I want to do this in remembrance
of Him. And when I walk out of this door, out of this room,
I want to walk out a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's pray together.