Coins“Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14: 25-33 ESV)

While the numbers have been in decline in recent years, statistically speaking, Christianity is still professed by greater numbers of Americans than any other world religion. Despite this profession, our culture has become much more pluralistic in the last decade than in previous generations, accepting a wider view of religious beliefs, and even blending the beliefs of various religions into a personal hodge podge of religiosity. Yet, when questioned, many Americans will still state that they call themselves Christians and follow Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

Interestingly, despite so many people professing a Christian faith, America has seen an alarming departure from the morality of its previous generations. Immorality in many forms, including fornication, adultery, homosexuality, drug use, and abortion, has drastically increased in recent years. And as the acceptance of sinful immorality has sky rocketed, conversely we have seen a greater denial of the authority of God’s word in the lives of professing Christians. That is not to say that professing Christians have rejected the Bible altogether; however, many are coming to say that either we have misunderstood the scriptures for the last 2,000 years by teaching things it does not say, or that many of the teachings in the Bible simply are not relevant in our more modern and progressive culture. God’s word is seen as valuable, but not necessarily authoritative in the lives of these Christians. Personal experience and communal tolerance hold a much higher value in their estimation.

It is with this understanding that we look at the passage of Scripture listed above. When Christ was teaching the multitudes, He was exposing their false understanding of what it meant to follow Him. Frequently, Christ confronted the expectations of His professed followers which would often result in many turning away from Him. Some sought to make Him an earthly King, yet He preached a spiritual kingdom. Others sought miracles to feed their bellies, yet He called them to forsake all and follow Him. When Christ preached this passage, He was exposing yet another false belief, one which has great application today. Jesus taught that there was great personal cost in professing to be His follower, one that called people to lay down their lives and surrender all to Him. A person could not seek the things of the world, to be at peace with the world, and be a follower of Christ. A person had to give it all up, to lose all claim to the things of this life, so that they might be a slave to the King. Such was the cost of being a disciple of Christ.

Jesus taught that, to be His disciple, all the attachments of this life had to be forfeit. Nothing could hold greater prominence in a believer’s life than their devotion to Him. Even the love that a person had for his family had to be so secondary in comparison to his love for Jesus, that it looked to the world as though that person hated his family. Often times, in our culture today, shifting beliefs in morality come when one discovers a loved one has professed a change in his or her moral behavior. For example, parents who previously saw homosexuality as sinful have a change of heart when their child professes same sex attraction. Yet, Christ declared that a person’s love for Him must outweigh the love that person has for family. A person must be willing to acknowledge Christ as Lord over all, including their family; therefore, they must be willing to submit to Him even when it brings that person in conflict with a loved one.

Today, such a teaching would be considered hateful. How can a family member elevate their religious beliefs over and above their love for their child, spouse or parents? In the eyes of the world, such devotion to a religious belief is abusive and degrading. Yet, Christ is above the world. He is the Creator and Sustainer of all life. He is the Author of what is right and wrong. In submitting to Him above our families, we point those we love to the true source of love and affection. We direct them to Him who will judge all sin and is the only source of salvation. By loving our families more than the Savior, we actually demonstrate hate for our families because we are unwilling to sacrifice our relationships in order to expose them to the truth of God’s wrath over sin.

Christ taught that to be His disciple meant to count the cost, to examine what we would likely lose when we dedicated our lives to follow Him. He used the example of one who seeks to build a tower, but fails to count the materials needed to accomplish the task. When a person starts a building project but fails to finish because they have run out of supplies, the foolishness of their task is exposed to the world. Such as it is for the professed Christian who does not take into account what they will lose to follow Christ. We who say we are disciples of the Lord will be hated by the world. Remember, the world sacrificed the holy Son of God out of hatred for Him. If it hated Him, it will hate us. If we profess to be students of His teaching, the world will reject us. The self righteous Pharisees rejected Christ’s teaching that their traditions were worthless because it addressed only outward appearance when their inward hearts were defiled. The world sees itself as good at heart, yet followers of Christ are those who admit to be sinful by nature. Thus, we can expect to be rejected by those who hate such a belief. Those who turn from Christ because the world hates them are exposed as foolish for never really being a follower to begin with. The world sees the hypocrisy of followers who turn away from the Leader before arriving at their destination.

Therefore, to be a follower of Christ means esteeming our Savior so highly that we are willing to lose all for the sake of Him. That means those who seek to redefine Christianity in order to be accepting of the world’s definition of morality have exposed themselves as not being followers at all. Personal experience, which is tainted by the stain of original sin, cannot be the standard by which we define our Christian faith. When we submit to our personal experience rather than the doctrines of scripture, we are elevating our fallible intellects and emotions over the perfect mind of God. Thus, those who claim to be followers of Christ are actually seeking to be His leader. They are attempting to bring Christ in line with their relationships so that they might appear to be loving, yet never lose esteem by those in the world. This is an attempt to reject the cost of losing anything for the sake of Christ, yet claim the status of being His disciple.

Jesus made it clear in this passage that anyone who was unwilling to count the cost, to forsake all to follow Him, could not be His disciple. To try and preserve one’s relationship with the world, to try to retain the esteem of those who reject Christ, is to in fact reject Christ Himself. It is to be counted as a hypocritical fool by both the world and the Savior. As Christ taught, we cannot serve two masters. We must reject one and submit entirely to the other. Thus, a true follower and disciple of Jesus Christ recognizes that His revealed word teaches us the truth of who we are. The scriptures, written by men under the divine inspiration of the Holy Spirit, are the only true means to reveal what the love of God really is. His word exposes that the heart of man is inherently wicked and that his desires are by nature in opposition to God. As such, God must judge all men for their sins. Yet, in His mercy, God made a way of salvation through Jesus Christ who died on the cross that He might take the deserved wrath of sinners. The Bible reveals that those who will turn from their sin in repentance and trust by faith alone in the finished work of Christ will receive forgiveness for their sins. And as Christ taught in this passage, such repentance and faith entails the absolute rejection of the favor of this world and a willingness to forsake all for the cause of Christ.

As noted above, our culture has a great many voices claiming to be disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. But, as evidenced by the growing acceptance of immorality, plurality and personal experience, such professions can only be false claims. A true disciple is one who wholly commits himself to Jesus alone. The true disciple is one who is willing to lose it all so that he or she might proclaim the truth and lead sinners to salvation through their Lord. They reject the world’s offers of peace through compromise and stand firmly on the truth of the gospel. True disciples value Christ and His revealed word above all.

To compromise our professed faith and walk in a manner that is accepted by the world is to reveal we are not what we claim to be. We are then truly disciples of the world, pretenders who care more for the esteem of others than the love of Christ. To truly reveal the love of Christ to the world, we should be set apart, made holy and unique by the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit. We should look, sound and act like our Master so that the world might come to repentance by seeing and hearing His disciples. Therefore, those who find themselves to be at odds with the word of God while claiming to follow Him must repent, and they must trust in Christ alone for the forgiveness of their sins for the first time. And then, be about the business of teaching the truth of our Lord and Savior so that others may find salvation.