[0:00] So as we've been getting up to Luke chapter number 14, we've heard a lot of strong statements of things that are said. Remember at the end of Luke 12, he said that he didn't come to bring peace on the earth, but he came to bring a division, Jesus was speaking.
[0:12] And that division came between those that decided he is Lord or recognized that he was Lord and those that wouldn't. And so division has come. We've spoken about a narrow dorm that you have to come.
[0:23] There's a proper way in which you can come to him. Another time we talked about a banquet that was taking place inside of a house. And everybody that was kind of out in the yard and out in the streets that kind of felt by proximity that they were going to get invited to the meal later on realized that they didn't have a place at the table because they didn't really know him.
[0:41] And so we shouldn't be surprised when we get to a statement like, you cannot be my disciple. However, that language still seems to be very shocking to us.
[0:52] To truly follow Jesus, we must consider the cost and put him above everything else. Salvation is absolutely free, meaning that the price paid for it was paid for us by Jesus Christ.
[1:06] But it will cost you your very life. And that sounds contradictory, doesn't it? How can we understand a gift that would have such a bearing upon your life? How could we understand a gift that would cost you your entire life?
[1:19] Maybe if that helps to explain it with what we've seen. Jesus comes up to a man that is blind. He's there outside of a synagogue. And Jesus heals a man. And Jesus gives him an incredible gift.
[1:30] Something that the man could not have merited. Something that only came from God. But what happened in that man's life? He lost his blindness. He lost his need to beg. He lost so many things that made up his identity.
[1:42] It absolutely changed his life. That free gift changed the life that he now have. It cost him everything about his old life. But it was all the things that he wanted to give away completely as he now found his identity in Christ.
[1:58] And so the gospel says everything in your life is about to change. Is what Jesus brings to them. And here's a group of Pharisees that have been teaching about behavior modification.
[2:10] About morality. About trying harder and doing everything. And Jesus keeps telling them, guys, you're just not getting it. What I came to do. What I'm doing on your behalf. And so we see in Jesus' story and what we've read.
[2:22] We'll continue through the passage. Is that there is a following that is not following. There is a following that is not following. Jesus looks out to a large group of people.
[2:33] As I said, some estimate in the tens of 20,000 people. More than the flannel graph came with for our kids, right? There's tons of people everywhere. Everywhere. And as he speaks to them, they're following.
[2:44] And what we're going to find here is that the word disciple is taking a significant change. As we see it in the Bible, the word disciple is used. It means a learner. And the rabbis had learners and they had disciples.
[2:57] John the Baptist and John 1 had some people that were called disciples. But it means a wide range of people. He's telling them, if you have ears, hear. And some of them, John 6 talks about a large group of them that were following.
[3:10] Jesus makes some hard statements and a lot of them leave. But before leaving, they refer to as students or learners or disciples. But this word is changing now. And what we're talking about from here forward is what it means to be a true disciple of Jesus.
[3:26] Not just following from a distance, but one that is really following him and letting him dictate their life. And what it means to be a true disciple. In the book of Acts 11.26 it says, So by the time the book of Acts, and when it's talking about the word disciples here, it's speaking about the ones that are truly following after Jesus.
[4:02] And that's who he's calling out here. He's outlining for them what it means to be a true disciple. And so the key is, if you look at verse 26 and verse 27 and verse number 23, this is not being a disciple of Jesus and a peripheral disciple, but being one who truly belongs to him.
[4:19] In verse 26, 27 and verse 33, he says, My disciple. A true disciple is a disciple of him. You have probably met, I know I have. I've met disciples of religion.
[4:30] I've studied all the religions. I read from this group and I read from this group. I am a student of religion, is what people would say. Or others might be a disciple of even church history.
[4:42] They know all about the history of the church and the fathers and all these things. And I've met people that are disciples of how just to live a good life. How to be moral. But those people that were disciples of religion and of church history and of morality, they're not necessarily disciples of Jesus.
[4:58] When he says, my disciples, that is where our allegiance is. That is who we are following. And so to truly be a believer is truly to be a disciple. This new life in God will result in a new way of living according to a new nature.
[5:15] There's going to be a growth in our lives in the areas of holiness. Philippians 1.6 says, And so for the point of salvation, where we receive the Holy Spirit, that earnest payment in our lives that will always be with us.
[5:36] And as we wait to that day that we see Jesus Christ, from that point on, he has begun a work in our lives. And just like he did it by faith and salvation, he continues that work of sanctification in our lives.
[5:49] And he is going to do that good work and he is going to perform it and bringing us and growing us in holiness. The seed of the word of God will bear fruit in our lives. But here on earth, we will not ever perfectly arrive.
[6:02] We will always be coming. We're always having things to put on, things to take off. Philippians 3.12, Not as though I have already attained, not as if I've already arrived, Paul says, or already perfect.
[6:13] But I follow after, if that I may apprehend, for which I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. I will follow after. That language of being a follower and a disciple continues all throughout God's word.
[6:27] So if a person claims to be a believer, but he isn't seeking to grow in obedience to Christ, then he's fooling himself. Because to be a believer is to be a person that's going to follow after him.
[6:40] It isn't horrific to think that in the Bible, in the Bible, and in the world that we live in, God forbid, in this room, that there'd be people, as it says in Matthew 7.22, that will say it in that day, Lord, Lord, I have prophesied in your name, I have cast out devils, I have done many wonderful works.
[6:57] But you will profess to them, and he will say, I never knew you, depart from me, you worker of iniquity. And so now as we look at this, and Jesus calling them to follow and to take up the cross, we see how it responds to the different areas that the people made the excuse.
[7:14] Jesus tells the story, and it must have been just baffling to the people. Nobody would turn down an invitation like this. It almost seems to be like the setup for a joke. This man lays a great banquet out because he's a great man with a great opportunity for people to come and eat at his table.
[7:31] But people make these excuses. And so Jesus gives in three, he lays out three costs to being a disciple. And he gives two parables to illustrate that. And so we look at it.
[7:41] First off in verse 26. Is Jesus contradicting himself in the Bible?
[8:00] Doesn't the Bible say to love our families? Doesn't it say that no man has ever hated his own flesh? Alex, if you wouldn't mind, I have a picture of my family here. And so just to know that as I think about this, I'm not just thinking how it applies to you, but how it also applies to me.
[8:18] And I think about my kids here and the command that I'm told here and having what would be hate for my own family. And you look up here, and this is a couple weeks ago, and you would say, well, which one?
[8:30] They're always wanting to know which one is my favorite. And I'm going to tell you who my favorite is today, okay? That's your intensely in here. And I'm going to be completely honest with you. My favorite person in this picture is the bearded old guy in the picture, okay?
[8:44] That dude, I really like that guy, all right? And so my love for them, if to be honest, it becomes very easy and natural for me to love that guy.
[8:56] But so when it tells me that my hate for my family doesn't just even stop there, which would be challenging, because I love those people very much, but it also includes me. And so that I would have a hate for my family, which includes me.
[9:09] Alex, you can move on. It's so beautiful. It's just distracting, isn't it? All right? And so Jacob says about Leah, it says in Genesis 29, 31, it says, When the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened up her womb, but Rachel was barren.
[9:25] So Jacob, it says he hated Leah. Maybe not in the way that you might be using the word, but in his love for Rachel, his love for Leah appeared to be, it was hate. It didn't appear to be hate.
[9:36] It was hate in the way that's being defined for us here. So a devotion to Christ cannot be anything less than wholehearted. It's completely given to him.
[9:46] So Jesus is saying that our allegiance and our love for him must be so great that by comparison, our love for our families and even for our own lives looks like hatred. If you'll think for a moment about all the things in which a Jewish family provided for a Jew, I think it also relates to us today.
[10:04] But the Bible is wonderful because it gives us an entire world. It gives us an entire context. We know exactly, we know so much about what it must have been like for a Jewish person in that day, these Pharisees that were listening, and then the crowd that was listening, when he told them to be willing to love him more than he'd even love family.
[10:24] First of all, the family provided status. They were superior, right, to the Gentile people. The Jewish man would look in the mirror every morning and say, God, I thank you that I'm not a woman and that I'm not a Gentile.
[10:36] Can you believe that? That's what we're told that they say. And they would say that, thank you that I'm not a Gentile, because there was such a status around being Jewish to be part of that family.
[10:46] It was also seen as a means of salvation, that somehow in this makeup of my upbringing and who I am, this has brought me salvation. Luke 3, 8, it says, Bring forth therefore fruits worthy of repentance, and begin not to say within yourselves.
[11:02] This is what they will say. And he says, don't begin to say this. We have Abraham to our father, for I say unto you that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.
[11:13] But a part of their understanding of salvation was, we are the children of Abraham. Why would they ever want to love anything more than that? It was their status, it was their salvation, but it was also their security.
[11:27] In this day, they didn't measure their financial security or future security in their insurance policy, or in social security, or in the bank account, but they measured it in terms of family.
[11:39] You needed to stay very tightly connected to your family. Those that you had cared for when they were younger are going to care for you when you're older. So Jesus wasn't about the family for the reasons that God had created the family, but he was opposed to the idol which had been made from the family, which looked to it for what?
[11:58] Status, salvation, and security. For their misunderstanding of the family, God says that you need to hate this, and you need to find it in the Lord, that it is greater.
[12:10] Do not look in your family for status or salvation or security, but only look in me. Do you know what you call anything that you look for for status, salvation, or security? You call that your God.
[12:22] So if it isn't the true God of heaven, you call that an idol, which would make that idolatry. And then he goes on to verse 27, And whosoever doth not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.
[12:34] We must carry our own cross. We've seen this language before. In 9.23, And he said unto them, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.
[12:47] A common response to Jesus when people would come to him and say that they wanted to be a follower of him. Or actually they would ask, What does it mean to have eternal life?
[12:57] How do I inherit the kingdom? And his answer would be, Follow me. And in that he would say, Take up a cross. This original audience would have no misunderstanding about the weight of what it meant to carry a cross.
[13:13] It didn't have any of the beautiful meaning. It had not made its way into jewelry. It had not made itself into architecture. And no picture of it did they have would have been anything but just simply horrific.
[13:28] The cross was an implementation of something that inconvenienced people or irritated them. But it was something that was a picture of a slow, torturous death. They immediately knew what it meant when Jesus said, Take up your own cross.
[13:42] Today we have to work. We have to, in so many things, We have to dig through our misunderstanding of what it is And really remember what we were talking about. We're talking about the electric chair of their day, right?
[13:54] We're talking about the firing squad of a different time. We're talking about a means unto death. It isn't often that you hear that said in a serious conversation.
[14:06] Christians, we should talk about carrying our cross and following the Lord. But how is it normally said? It's normally said maybe in jest. You know, you go somewhere and you're ordering donuts and they don't have the donuts you want.
[14:17] And the people say, Well, I just know some of us have a cross to bear. Somebody says, Hey, you look really sharp. You're a good looking person. Well, that's just the cross I have to bear in my life. Or here's a picture of a man.
[14:28] I couldn't believe there's a man carrying a cross here. I couldn't believe how many people. Have you ever seen a person on the side of the road carrying their cross across America? I thought, Hey, I'm going to look up who that guy was that carried the cross from one side of the country to the other side of the country.
[14:43] Do you know who he is? He's hundreds of people. Hundreds of people have carried their cross from one side to another. I wouldn't be opposed to the cross carrying. It's all the walking that I really would be opposed to going from one side to another.
[14:58] And so people say, Carry your cross. And we talk about it maybe ingest. As Christian people, We shouldn't speak about the cross ingest. But that's how it might be used. Or maybe in a literal sense.
[15:09] But what are we really speaking about when we're talking about this cross that is given to us? Our prized possession, Which is considered foolishness to the world.
[15:20] 1 Corinthians 1.18. It says, For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness. But unto us which are saved, it is the power of God.
[15:33] So there's two views in this world about the cross. There is this foolishness, and those people will perish. And then to us, it is the power of God unto salvation.
[15:44] I mean, it is everything. There's a young preacher. He came to the church, and a woman came up to him and said, Now I hope you're not going to say too much about the blood. Our other preacher talked about it all the time.
[15:56] And I hope you're not going to make too much of the blood. He looked at her and said, Well, madam, I'm not going to make too much of the blood. And she said, Oh, I'm so delighted to hear that you are not.
[16:07] And then he said very seriously, You can't make too much of the blood. You can't speak too much about the cross. I mean, honestly, it would be well worth our time if every Sunday morning when we gathered here, I took you through a simple gospel presentation that reminded you of the fact that Jesus Christ died in your place.
[16:24] He died a horrific death. He took the cross in our place. Another story by G. Campbell Morgan said that when he first came to a country, a lady came up and said, Dr. Morgan, the cross is offensive to me.
[16:35] I don't like to hear a preacher talk about it because it is ugly and is unsightly, and I don't like to hear that sort of thing. Dr. Morgan, in his characteristic manner, said, Madam, I thoroughly agree with you.
[16:47] It is an offense. It is an ugly thing. But the only ugliness in that cross is your sin and my sins. That our sins went to the cross, that that's where they were paid for.
[16:57] So when Jesus is asking us to take up a cross, what is it that he is asking? Jesus here is looking at the process of a daily death, the selfish desires, and of the willingness to bear reproach for his namesake.
[17:12] A willingness to bear reproach for his namesake. It's been six or seven years ago. I was in New Philadelphia, Ohio, and I preached them on a Sunday morning, and I referenced many times about not being ashamed of the cross.
[17:26] And I said that over and over again. Well, at that church on Monday morning, they would have a staff meeting, and they would go through the service, and they would talk about what happened and what was confusing and how do we help people.
[17:37] And then they got to the sermon, and they said, Would you like to stay in here for that? Would you like us to skip over it? And I just said, No, let's just do it. You know, help me. I want to be a better communicator of God's Word.
[17:48] And one of the things that they said was that you constantly referenced not being ashamed of the cross, but you never explained to the congregation what exactly that meant.
[17:59] And I found that to be very helpful. And it is a blessing. We speak in shorthand sometimes in church because we spend time in this Word. I'm aware that I'm not the only person teaching you the Bible.
[18:11] You're studying it yourself. You're teaching it to other people. But this understanding of bearing a cross ourselves is something that's worth our time. If you know it as a reminder, and if you don't, I want to make sure you know what we're saying when we're talking about taking up your cross, what we're talking about being willing to bear the reproach for His namesake, this daily death of selfish desire.
[18:33] Galatians speaks a great deal of it. Galatians 5.11, Paul speaks to the offense of the cross. And he says, I and I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, I mean, teaching of the law, of the Old Testament, of all the things that a person must do that was given to him in the law, why do I yet suffer persecution?
[18:51] Then is the offense of the cross ceased? See, the offense of the cross comes in in that it says that you cannot depend on your own merit or your own systems, but then that it is not going to be found in anything outside of Jesus Christ dying for you.
[19:11] The offense of the cross is not just the fact that Jesus Christ died on the cross, but that it cuts to the root of human merit and the matter of justification. What is an offense about the cross?
[19:21] I think if you talk to anybody, everybody's okay with us worshiping somebody, a man 2,000 years ago that died on the cross. Fine. He was historically true. He really lived.
[19:32] He got on a cross and he died. And if you want to believe he rose again, maybe that's fine with you. But where it's really going to cut is where they say, he died on the cross because you are sinful.
[19:43] And without his death on the cross, you could never have any hope of knowing the Father. That's where the offense comes in is that people do not like it. They fight against the fact that when you tell them that they are the reason.
[19:57] Some years ago, somebody talked about the sticker, you are the reason for the season, right? We say Jesus is the reason for the season, but you could also put a sticker on somebody and say you are the reason for the season because you're the reason that Jesus came and died.
[20:13] And that person put it on his mother-in-law and probably shouldn't have done that. All right. You are the reason for the season. You are the reason that Jesus Christ had to come to earth and die. And it is true.
[20:24] Your sins are the reasons for his death upon that cross. Innocent, without any guilt, perfectly blameless, but your sin is what took him to the cross. And either you know that and you love that and we celebrate it today or you think it's foolishness and you deny it.
[20:39] In Romans, we get more understanding of the offense of the cross. Romans 9, 31. It says, But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore, because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of law.
[20:54] For they stumbled at the stumble stone, as it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and a rock of a fence, and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.
[21:05] The fence or the stumbling over the cross came because they sought to merit their own salvation by works. And so it says here in Galatians that there's a way in which you can avoid the shame and reproach and the fence of the cross.
[21:20] Galatians 6, 12. As many as desire to make a fair show in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ.
[21:32] If you will say that the cross of Christ happened, but if you will say that there's other means in which you need to be saved, you need to also, baptism will save you, good works will save you, following this moral ceremonial code will save you.
[21:46] If you will do that, then it will cause you to not suffer from the persecution of Christ. And that's what is being fought here in Galatians. Then Paul says that the cross changed his relationship with the world.
[22:01] We started off speaking about how some people see it as foolishness and they will perish, but others of us see it as our prized possession that we rejoice in it. Paul said in Galatians 6, 14.
[22:14] But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world. His stance, his position, his willing association to the cross made the world crucified unto him and him unto the world.
[22:33] It created that division in which Jesus Christ said that he would bring. So Jesus tells us to take up our cross. Jesus means we must join him in suffering. Every disciple has a cross to bear.
[22:45] We must pick it up and carry it daily. And the cross is our dying. It is a self-denial. And then he continues here in verse number 33. So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.
[23:01] This willingness to give up all possessions. To follow Christ truly, we must consider the cost. The statement comes after two parables. That forsake all that you have comes after two parables.
[23:14] The first one has to do with a building. Jesus says, who killed a big tower, a large building? You don't sit down, first look at it, and count the cost, and make sure that you don't get yourself in a position where the foundation is laid, but it's not finished.
[23:27] Because if you do, then people come by and mock and say that this building that began cannot be finished. You could probably think of examples like that, especially in this area. Think about now where the Avalon was in early 2006, 2007, 2008.
[23:41] That parking lot that is there now, it's set there for many years. Because those that counted the cost to build that, there was parts of the equation that they did not know how to factor into it.
[23:52] So what it gave it was something, it was an eyesore, right? People would drive by, and it says, is that thing ever going to get done? Our Lord here is not trying to get the followers to muster up enough commitment to become disciples, but He wants them to reckon with the reality that none of them have the resources to follow Him outside of His enablement.
[24:12] And that's what they need to do. They need to come to this and say, God, I'll never be able to do this unless You do this in and through me. And then the second story, a man, a king is going to go off to the war and he has a certain amount, but the opposing country, the opposing nation, has double the amount of people, causing us to consider the hardships of being a good soldier of Christ to consider this.
[24:35] We have to weigh the cost. We weigh the cost of discipleship is what everybody should do. But you also need to weigh the cost of non-discipleship.
[24:46] The cost of discipleship, famous book by Deidre Bonhoeffer, something we talk about often or you'd hear about, the cost of discipleship. But you have, if you're a believer in here, you have considered what is the cost of non-discipleship?
[24:58] What is it the cost of not following Jesus? And he says at the end of this, another story that's given, he speaks about salt. It's good. How many of you say salt is good, right?
[25:09] You just got to have it. I watch TV show at Lone's sometimes where they're out in Alaska and they get to bring 10 items with them. One guy decided he was bringing salt. I'm like, I'm with that guy, okay? Because some of that squirrel and rabbit and fish, it's going to need some salt, all right?
[25:23] And so they take the salt and they put it on it. It says salt is good, but if it lost its savor, if it lost its flavor, it can't be re-seasoned, right? You can't put seasoning flavor on salt.
[25:36] It is the flavor. It is the nature of that salt. And if it's lost him, speaking here very likely of this impure type of salt, a true salt can't lose its side.
[25:46] It just ceases to be salt if it loses it. But in this time in Asia, it would have this impureness of it, an impure salt that would be mixed with other things to make it go farther.
[25:58] And it says if you have a salt that doesn't have a flavor, then what good is it? You might as well just throw it out. You might as well put it out on the roads and then we can run over it. We put it out.
[26:09] It's not even worth anything to us here. And he tells them to listen. He says, so now that speaks about the cost of non-discipleship, what it means not to follow. Remember, we have spoken often about this man in Mark chapter number 10 who was off to such a strong start.
[26:25] He said, when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running and kneeled to him and asked, good master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? The man came to Jesus.
[26:36] He kneels down. He calls him the good master. And Jesus beholding him, he loved him and he said unto him, one thing thou lackest, go thy way, so whatsoever thou hast and give it to the poor and thou shalt have treasure in heaven and take up your cross and follow me.
[26:52] That's what he tells the man. And this invitation, it devastated the man. Suddenly he understood that he could not serve God and money, which in Luke 16, it just comes out and says that.
[27:03] You can't serve two masters. What will happen if you try to serve masters? You will love one and you will what? There's that word again. You will hate the other and you will hold to one and despise the other because you cannot serve God and maim him.
[27:18] And so what was the result that day? He walked away sorrowful because the cost of discipleship had been too high for him. And so what did that man lose that day? What did he lose?
[27:29] Consider that. What would you have lost that when you heard the gospel message and you did not put your faith and trust in him? He lost the forgiveness of all of his sins and reconciliation with the Father.
[27:41] He lost the joy of having fellowship with the Father and the Son. 1 John 1.3 He lost the empowering presence and the joy of the Holy Spirit. Acts 13.52 He lost the profound sign and wonder and joy and strength and comfort of being part of God's body, the church, and the everlasting fellowship of the saints.
[28:02] He lost the provision of God's sufficient grace for every need. He lost the privilege of participating in the destruction of the devil's work. He lost the unspeakable joy of knowing every precious and very great promise of God found their yes for him in Jesus.
[28:19] He lost the triumphant joy of seeing others delivered from the domain of darkness. He lost the abundant life that Jesus would have given him and he lost eternal joy. He walked away from the heavenly treasure of eternal life with God and an inheritance so great that the worst suffering of this age is light and momentary and temporary and passing by comparison.
[28:43] He lost God. He chose money over God and so he chose poverty. And this is the tragedy of idolatry and we shouldn't let it happen to us or we should let it happen to anybody we know.
[28:57] I go back to that example down on exit 9 or there at the Halcyon about a cost that was gathered. There was something they didn't know when they were counting the cost. When this man was counting what it was like to follow Jesus and he says, taking on my cross and following you is too great.
[29:14] He didn't properly measure all that he was losing in choosing manmen over following Jesus. Compelling people and sharing with them is helping them accurately count the cost of discipleship and non-discipleship.
[29:30] But we have other stories in the Bible, don't we? Not just in the Bible but in your own life. A man who was changed by the gospel, Luke 9, 5, and when Jesus came to a place he looked up and he saw him and he said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste and come down for the day I must abide at thy house.
[29:48] And we count the cost of discipleship on what we treasure. The Bible says, for where your treasure is there will your heart be also. What was the result of Zacchaeus?
[29:59] Zacchaeus, when he was brought to that same position as the other man? Zacchaeus, he joyfully gave his wealth to the poor. He repaid all those that he had committed fraud to, those victims, four times what he had stolen.
[30:13] I don't imagine there was much left for him. But for Zacchaeus, the cost of non-discipleship was too high of a price for him to pay. And so I ask you today, what is it that is capturing your heart?
[30:27] In this world there is a young man and there's also people like Zacchaeus. The rich young man, he appeared to be religious and wealthy. Zacchaeus didn't appear to be religious at all, he was just wealthy.
[30:39] But when he came to a place and he was told to take up his cross and follow after him, he was able to count the cost properly of discipleship versus non-discipleship.
[30:50] And he followed after Jesus regardless of the troubles that it might have brought him, regardless of the cost. And if Jesus exposes an idol, something that you feel that you cannot give up in order to follow him, don't just walk away.
[31:06] You don't have to walk away. Your story can be different than the rich young man. Don't choose the poverty of any worldly gain over eternal gain, for you will find that it is not gain at all.
[31:18] And instead of walking away, climb. Climb to whatever sycamore you must in order to get a glimpse of Jesus. That is what we learn in Zacchaeus that day.
[31:30] That man, he had the same life, everything was said in him, but he had heard something about this man Jesus. And there's just something different about him. And so that day when he was passing by, that wee little man that we would sing about, right?
[31:43] That's always what I think about. I'm always surprised I don't find it in the Bible. Forget we sing it in the song, right? Zacchaeus was a wee little man. He climbed up in that sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see.
[31:54] Jesus passed by that day. He got a glimpse of Jesus. And because he got a glimpse of Jesus, when he sat down at the table to do the math that day, he just said, I'm all in.
[32:06] Whatever you want, Jesus. But the rich young ruler, he missed out. I want to remind you as Kristen comes to the piano here, I want to help you get just a glimpse of Jesus.
[32:18] I want to help you climb up in the sycamore tree. I want you to see the cost of discipleship versus the cost of non-discipleship, that Jesus Christ is the real game. Yea, doubtless, Philippians 3, 8, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and to count them but dung that I may win Christ.
[32:42] Everything in this world. Take this world, but what? Give me Jesus, is what a true disciple would say. Christ is the real treasure, the one that is worth selling everything that there is to get, right?
[32:55] A man finds a treasure in a field, and he says, it's going to take everything that I have. There's a story called The Great Pearl where a man sees this pearl in a jewelry shop, and he says, I want to buy this, and the jeweler said, you can have it, you can buy it, but it's going to cost you everything.
[33:11] He gives them what he has, and he says, now I've got to go home, and he says, oh, you have a home, I'm going to need that too. You're going to drive home, I'm going to need your car. You mentioned having a family, it's going to cost you your family, and it's going to cost you yourself.
[33:24] You can have this, but it's going to cost you everything. That's what Jesus Christ offered us as salvation, but he took our blindness and he made us like that blind man that can see. All the things that we held on so tightly, why would we not want to let go of those for what he has?
[33:39] Maybe you're in here today and you're counting the cost of following Christ. I want you to have a glimpse of Jesus. He is the real gain. He is the real treasure, and the Spirit can cause you to transform what you believe to be most important in your life to what truly is most important.
[33:54] If you will look into him and you will live, if you'll be like Zacchaeus and you will get a glimpse of Jesus and to see him for who he truly is, in the Bible tells us that we can ask and we can seek and we can knock and we can ask, but what you can also do is you can climb and you can climb and get a glimpse of Jesus.
[34:14] It's a Sunday morning. We gather today to worship Jesus, a room full of professing believers for the most part. Can I ask you today, you have some friends, you have some family members and they haven't properly evaluated the cost of Jesus.
[34:27] They haven't properly evaluated the cost of not following Jesus. Would you do all that is possible to give them a glimpse of him, to take them up as high as you can and let him see Jesus as he passes by.
[34:40] And when you see him like Zacchaeus, you will find the joy. You will with joy give away what used to capture your heart rather than lose the treasure that is found in Christ.
[34:52] Heavenly Father, I pray that you'll be with my brothers and sisters in here today, Lord. I pray first of all for the believers in this room, Lord, that had been like Zacchaeus. Maybe they were living their life not thinking anything of you until that day they got a glimpse of you and after that glimpse of you, Lord, they were willing to sit down and say that I want all in.
[35:11] I want to follow you. There is no cost that is too great. And then Father, I pray that there's only anybody in here today and they're just sitting at the table, Lord. They're trying to do the math.
[35:23] They're trying to wonder why would they ever want something that would cost them everything. Help them see what the true everything is. Help them see what the true gain is in life. And then Father, I pray you have given us the responsibility as your servants that compel people.
[35:41] And part of our job is to help people properly assess what it means to follow you, to properly help them see the gain that is found in giving their lives completely to follow you.
[35:52] Father, I ask that you would help us be very good representatives. Help us be able to show people the wonder and the beauty and the majesty and why following you is worth everything in all of this world.