Counting the Cost

Good morning, Vietnam! I'm going to have to cut

that. I'm going to leave that in. You should.

Oh, man. That's from Robin Williams. Robin Williams.

The late, the great Robin Williams. Listen, so

here's what I hate about whenever I start talking.

What you hate about Robin Williams? What I hate

about talking about movies I have not seen in

a long time. Okay. Because my memories of this

movie, incredible movie. Okay. It could have

horrible language. And I just don't remember,

right? But from what I remember about that movie,

it was like a really good, like Robin Williams,

he's a comedic guy, but it's more of a dramatic

role. But it's a good movie. Have you seen that

movie? No, I haven't. Really? No, I haven't.

That's one I think you should add to your list.

That's the what is going on. I saw a movie this

weekend. Yesterday. Yesterday. I watched a movie.

that is an American classic that I feel like

I am more American than I've ever been because

I had never watched this movie before. What movie

was this? For the very first time in my life.

Yeah. I watched Smokey and the Bandit. Smokey

and the Bandit. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Have you seen

this movie? No, I haven't seen this movie. So

it's one of those movies that I have heard just

in our culture. Okay. In the culture. I've heard

referenced countless times. I thought I knew

what it was about. I had no idea what it was

about. Now that you finished the movie, do you

know what it's about? Did you ever get to that

point? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was a 70s movie.

So there was kind of a plot. Okay. And mainly

it involved CB radios. Interesting. Like truck

driving. I know what a CB radio is, Sean. You

know, one of the interesting things... One interesting

thing about coming to church here in Stanley

County, coming from my background, is the things

that people call stuff. There are different words

for the same thing. It's English vocabulary,

but it's different English vocabulary. It's regional

differences, right? So the sandals that I'm prone

to wear are called Chacos. It's the brand of

sandals that they are, right? Every time I wear

them in Stanley County, somebody will go, you

got your Jesus shoes on. You know, you're doing

what you can. So speaking of that, so like an

actual illustration of that as well. Okay. It's

like just one of those learning curves you get

when you move to Stanley County. because when

I moved here and I was learning all of the different

areas around Norwood, my community, and I was

very interested when I learned that there was

an Aquedale here. What? Exactly. I was told very

quickly, no, no, no, even though it is spelled

Aquedale, it is it. Aquedale. Aquedale. It is

Aquedale. So that was one that I got corrected

very fast because I don't remember who I was

talking to, but I remember referring to Aquedale

to someone, and they looked at me like I was

a foreigner because I was. Well, you've gotten

your Aquedale on. There's somebody I was talking

to as I was trying to get the dialect down that

told me that their dad called it Ackydale. Ackydale?

Ackydale. I'm not sure whether it was derived

from, like, and you're saying the Q, Accudale,

or if it's Accudale, A -C -K -Y -D -A -L -E.

So the interesting thing is someone will have

to brush me up on my Stanley County history.

I believe from what I was told it was called

that because there was an aqueduct running through

that area or something like that. So it actually

does have to do with water, and it really is

aqua, but you don't pronounce it that way. Okay.

You know what? That is good for me. That's good

for me to know. Yeah, and you know what? This

is good, because one of the things that I like

about you, Ben, since you've been here, is you

love to ask what you call culture questions.

That is true. All the time. I mean, I don't even

know if we've ever talked about this on the podcast.

I don't think we have. Just so for our Pursuing

Jesus listeners here, this is something that

Ben has become famous for in the office. Because

there's many times where he will walk into anyone

and everyone's office, and he will open the dialogue

by saying, I have a culture question. That's

true. That's true. But they're all good, and

they all make sense because it is. Because you

go from church to church. You go to a different

church. You go to a different region. There are

things that they do different culturally, and

it's good to learn those things. Well, I'll tell

you this. At our last Triple L gathering for

our - Triple L. Triple L. That's right. That's

right. I don't know if anybody - That's how they

refer to it all the time. Triple L. But at our

last Triple L meeting, the Josies - shout out

to the Josies, brought some delightful desserts.

Oh, shout out to the Josies and their desserts.

As they have been prone to do. Yes. What Oren

and Nancy made this time was homemade cherry

ice cream. Now, I have never had homemade ice

cream before. Wait. What? This was my first time.

In your entire life? In my miserable little life.

You've never had homemade ice cream? Your reaction

is the reaction that 20 separate people have

to be saying that. And it was a dollar at once.

It was a chain. Like I was sitting at a table.

This didn't happen in front of everybody. No,

I was sitting at a table with Cornelia Hatley

and a couple other folks. And I was like, man,

this is so good. I've never had homemade ice

cream before. And Cornelia goes, you've never

had homemade ice cream before? And she called.

somebody else to the table and she's like ben's

never had homemade ice cream before and that

person said you've never had homemade ice cream

before and like they kept it was a chain it was

like a phone tree like they kept calling over

more people and finally i was like no i'm not

cultured like you guys i'm working on it homemade

ice cream and by the way delightful delightful

okay church church church okay we're having a

moment right now church here's i need your help

right now i need i need some people to come make

homemade ice cream in different flavors and bring

it to Ben. Now, when you do that, I'm going to

request some too. But I'm not doing this selfishly

all the way. I feel like you're doing this selfishly.

This man needs to experience peach homemade ice

cream for sure. For sure. At least peach. That

is like a summer tradition. Really? Peach homemade

ice cream. So this isn't new for you either.

No. Interesting. Yeah. Hey, you know what? I

think there was someone in the church that had

like a cookies and cream homemade ice cream.

That was really good. If I remember, I can't

remember, but, uh, all right, church, y 'all

got to help me culture this guy. Well, so, so

here, so counteroffer. Okay. The next, the next

church gathering, the next time that we have

like a potluck or something, like, I think that

we should announce to all the folks at the church,

like, like for desserts, bring your homemade

ice cream. We can have a homemade ice cream competition.

So I'm pretty sure. I want to be one of the judges.

We can have the staff judge it. Yes. Yes. 100%.

I'm behind this idea now. You know, but if you're

going to do that, you're going to have a homemade

ice cream competition. We're going to have a

good prize. I don't know what that would be.

Ooh. All right. We're going to have to think

on that one. We have to think with them. Yeah.

For the time being, are you ready to dive into

a little bit of scripture, Sean? You know. That

is why we're here. We're here to pursue Jesus.

Through homemade ice cream. Through homemade

ice cream. Listen, Jesus put us on this earth

to enjoy some of the things of the earth, to

enjoy. I mean, even like you look at the Psalms.

Yeah. I mean, you look at the Psalms and the

joy that they received from different parts of

nature. Oh, taste. And see that the Lord is good.

Man, you know. But like, if you think about it.

If you think about it, God didn't have to make,

and I'm being legitimately serious, God didn't

have to make our world in color. 100%. I understand

where you're going with this. There are animals

that you have rods and cones in your eyes. The

cones are how you see color. The rods are how

you see black and white. There are animals that

live perfectly functional lives. I think maybe

dogs are some of them. I've heard dogs. That

they see in black and white. God didn't have

to make color. God chose to make color as part

of his creative expression. God didn't have to

make taste. There are plenty of other organisms

in this world that either don't have a tongue

or don't taste or any of these things. They are

ways of enjoying his goodness and his creativity.

Those can be spiritual things. I think that's

part of eating and drinking to the glory of God.

I think it's in 1st or 2nd Corinthians where

we actually can engage in worship by enjoying

good things. I noticed this in some church traditions

where renouncing things just for the sake of

renouncing them is spiritualized. The historical

word for that is asceticism. Not anesthetism

or aesthetics, but asceticism. Yes. But they

renounced everything like, that is good, I don't

want it. That is good, I don't want it. That

is good, I don't want it. One of the ways that

we enjoy God is enjoying the good things that

he's given us, including homemade ice cream.

Amen and a -women, as you would say. I've never

said that before. I'm pretty sure you have. Luke

14, 25 through 33. Let's get into the text, Sean.

Oh, man. You know what? Yeah, let's get into

it. So this is June 8th's passage from the Pursuing

Jesus devotional. And the title, that the Bible

I was using gives this section is called The

Cost of Following Jesus. Yep. And there's a couple

things that I want to point out. First off, here's

the very first thing I noticed. So it starts

in Luke 14, verse 25, as you said, and literally

Luke 14:25

one of the first few words, right? It says, now

great crowds were traveling with him. Now that's

interesting to me. Okay. Right? Because Jesus...

Sometimes when we picture Jesus because of Sunday

school lessons or whatever, a lot of times I

feel like people just picture 12 dudes just chugging

along with him and just walking along. And there

was times when it was just him and his close

disciples or the apostles. And that's actually

something funny that I'm going to get off on

a tangent on real quick because I was talking

to my students the other day, and there was some

of them, and they were like, so Jesus had 12

disciples? And I was like... Kind of, you know,

and I had to explain to them that, you know,

we interchanged the word disciple and apostle

a lot just because of our culture and how we

refer to these guys. But I had to let them know,

like, no, there was 12 apostles. There was 12

dudes that were set aside for a specific purpose,

for a specific ministry. But Jesus had multiple

disciples and disciples, but also just people

that followed him because he did cool stuff.

And he had many faithful disciples outside of

the 12. I think it's Luke 8 that talks about

the three ladies that followed him that bankrolled

his ministry, which is a crazy thing. I had never

read that until recently. But maybe it's in Mark

when he sends out the 72. Yeah, exactly. He gives

them authority to cast out demons and to heal.

We talked about that 18 podcasts ago. But Jesus

had many disciples. He had 12 apostles. It's

just a good, healthy reminder as we interchange

terminology in our modern context through preaching

and teaching and things. Just remember, no, there

was a lot of disciples. Yeah. But here. There's

a specific word used, and it's not disciples.

Okay. It's crowds. Yeah. And so a lot of times

when you look at the Gospels, you're going to

see different terminology used to describe the

people that are following Jesus or that are around

Jesus at the time of whatever's taking place.

Whenever it refers to crowds, that means that

there are people with him. One, there are disciples

there. Yep. However many, we don't know, but

there's disciples. But that means there's people

that are following him at this moment that have

become awestruck by maybe we could call it the

entertainment of Jesus. Or just interested. The

miracles. Like he's doing stuff and they're like,

that was cool. I want to keep seeing more of

this, right? Or even just a seeking understanding

of like, how did this happen? I need to understand

more. But understanding that, now reading the

passage to see what he's about to say. is very

interesting. For sure. Especially in our modern

church context. So we'll get to that in a second.

But let me just read. Let me read the words in

red, if you will, and start in verse 26 and see

what he does when he turns around, looks at the

crowd, and then immediately turning around, looking

at the crowd, says this. Verse 26. If anyone

comes to me and does not hate his own father

and mother, wife and child, brothers and sisters,

yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.

All right, let's just pause there. That's enough

for now. Pardon? I mean, just imagine you're

one of the crowds, not the disciple. You're the

interested. Like I said, multiple reasons you're

there. You could be very interested in wanting

to seek and learn more, or you could be just

following because you have no other thing else

to do in your life, and you're just following.

Like, whatever. I don't know. We don't know the

reasons, but it is a crowd of people. Correct.

And Jesus sees a crowd of people following him

and drops one of the most crazy lines in Scripture,

you know, and just says, hey. You really want

to follow me? All right, cool. Hate your family,

hate all this, hate all this, hate all this.

And we know from looking, this is why it's important

to look at Scripture, even the Gospels, as a

total story. Yeah. Right? Because this could

very easily be taken out of context. Yeah, this

is one of the passages that people struggle with.

They do, because they read just this. they'll

have someone on TikTok say, hey, go read that

one verse. And look, it's words in red. You see

what Jesus just said there? Oh my gosh, is that

the Jesus you want to follow? And they'll call

it a contradiction too because of the Ten Commandments.

Honor your father and mother that it may go well

with you and your days be long. Right. But when

we look even at this entire story and we look

at the other parables that he's about to share,

that's what he's doing. He's giving an example

of the cost of discipleship. And he's showing

like, hey, if you really want to follow me, if

you want to, I mean, you've got to be willing

to lay down your life for me is ultimately where

he's eventually going to go with this. And it's

showing that in comparison. To the love that

you have for your family, the love that even

you have for your wife. That was one of the things

that as you get deeper into Christian culture,

you forget some of the things that you say and

how wild they are. Because one of the things

that I say and that I truly believe is that my

relationship with the Lord is more important

than the relationship with my wife. And me saying

that within the church walls, people are like,

amen, right? Yeah, we get it. But people outside

the church don't understand that. Well, how could

they? Exactly. Because they're like, whoa, hold

on. That's pinnacle relationship right there.

That's a very intimate relationship, and all

of a sudden you're saying that there's another

relationship more important to that? Right. And

so I think that's also one of the things that

as we... as we Christianese so much stuff, and

as we speak within our Christian circles, it's

important to remember that sometimes we say things

and people don't understand what we're saying,

because just because we're used to it doesn't

mean... I mean, going back to the vocabulary

of Norwood and the culture questions, there's

things that we do within our Christian culture

that look really weird on the outside. And it's

kind of one of those things, but I love... And

it's true, and my wife will say the same thing.

And it is. And the reason we say that, the reason

that I say that my relationship with Jesus is

more important than my wife and the reason that

my wife will say the relationship with Jesus

is more important than me is because we have

fully realized within our 19 years of marriage

that we've gone through that the closer we are

to Jesus separately and then the closer we are

to Jesus together, the better we are together.

Yeah. I mean, I've heard that described as a

triangle, right? You're both moving towards Jesus,

and as you move towards Jesus, you move closer

to yourself, or to each other, rather. And it's

one of those things that it is, I think it's

hard to grasp. Until you experience it. And then

you realize, oh, I understand what they were

saying now. You can see the concept, and I think

you can have a knowledge of it, of a knowledge

understanding of that concept of growing closer.

But then when you really do it, and you really

make that a part of your marriage life, it's

like, oh, wow. I didn't realize that our marriage

could get this much better. I wonder, though,

doesn't that... premise also apply to the other

areas of our lives though. I mean, so as we are

following Jesus and pursuing Jesus, the other

areas of our lives change too. I mean, like if

you're working in the church or out of the church,

you're a better employee in some ways. You're

more honest. You're more willing to show grace

and mercy to people. You're willing to own up

to your wrongs because you recognize that you're

a sinful human being. the more that you pursue

Jesus. And so I think that premise is more evident

in marriage because conflict is more obvious

in marriage. You live with the person you're

fighting with. There is no escape. I think that's

real though. One of the other things about this

verse 25 that is interesting to me, because I

was reading up on this and... The Greek and Hebrew

here for the word hate is different than the

hate that we have in the English language. Ooh,

let's hear about this. I won't be able to say

the Hebrew words or the Greek words, but this

is a callback to when the book of Hebrews says

that God hated Esau but loved Jacob. The Hebrew

here doesn't indicate what we would indicate

as hate and love. It refers to... it refers to

dramatic choice. And so Jesus isn't saying, man,

I got to hate my dad, or you got to hate your

mom, or you got to hate your wife or your kids,

your brothers, because elsewhere in scripture,

we know it says love one another. Fathers don't

provoke your kids to anger. Husbands love your

wives as Christ loved the church, but it's a

question of priority. Yeah. how do I see my marriage

compared to this? How do I see my family compared

to this? How do I see my obedience to my parents

compared to this? Because if we love any of those

things more than Jesus, those become the gods

in our lives. And when there's a conflict between

what God wants me to do and what my idealized

relationship with my parents, my idealized kids.

or my idealized marriage, when that conflict

comes, it's idolatry if we choose our family

over that. But through Jesus, we can love those

things in their right place. Yeah. Because they

are dramatically important. And the roles of

marriage, the roles of fatherhood and motherhood,

the roles of being faithful, honorable children

are all designed by God. And so I think that,

and obviously, Jesus sets up each of these stories

for a purpose. So he just laid the foundation,

right? He laid the foundation of, okay, this

is what a relationship with me looks like. And

then he really goes into a story of truly...

talking about counting the cost, right? So verse

28, he says, for which of you wanting to build

a tower does not first sit down and calculate

the cost to see if he has had enough to complete

it. Otherwise, after he has laid the foundation

and cannot finish it, all the onlookers will

begin to ridicule him saying, this man started

to build and wasn't able to finish. And so once

again, you've got this language with the crowd

present. Very important context of who he's speaking

to. And he's letting these guys know, hey, this

is what this relationship is going to look like.

And also, are you really willing to commit that?

Think about what I'm saying. Think about the

cost. Are you willing to go that far? And I think

that's so important. And once again, going to

our modern American Christian context, many times

we, even if it's like... Especially within the

SBC circles, we like to bash on prosperity gospel.

It is what it is. And I'm not saying I agree

with prosperity gospel, but it's just one of

those easy targets within our church culture.

But at the same time, I feel like there's those

little pieces of like, well, if I come to Jesus,

my life's going to be better. That happens within

even our church context. Yeah. We think all of

our problems are going to be solved. You know,

you hear like, oh, come to Jesus and everything's

going to be good. Everything's going to be right.

And there is a portion of that because of our

heart and because of how much we love him. But

that doesn't mean we're not going to go through

hard times. Well, that's workspace faith. Yes.

At the end of the day, that is transactional.

You give me what I need, so I give you what you

need. I do the right thing enough of the time

for you to bless me. I've got a dear friend of

mine who's wrestling with that right now. I don't

think he listens to this podcast, but I'm not

going to drop his name. But he's had some really

hard things happen over the past couple of years.

Dude lost his mom. He was in the hospital for

a couple of months. And he's like, why would

God let this happen even though I've been so

faithful? And it's hard because the principle

we see in this text, Jesus has a lot of ands,

right? Going back to 26. Does not hate his father

and mother and wife and children and brothers

and sisters. Yes, even his own life. The price

of discipleship involves our relationships with

our family, but the pinnacle of the price of

discipleship is our own lives. And so setting

those in Jesus' hands is really hard, particularly

when we go through hard things in his hands.

Yeah, man, that's a really good thought. I'm

glad you added that little bit on there. That's

good for us to think about. There is a cost.

There is a cost. There is a cost to following

Jesus. And that's something that we need to be

aware of. That the closer you get to Jesus, the

more you're going to see that cost. But the first

cost has been paid and will continue to be paid.

Yeah. Like Jesus paid the first cost for us.

With his lifeblood and his perfect life, he conquered

sin and death. And so as we are... What did you

say? Bearing our own cross? Yeah. Jesus took

the first cross and in a very real sense is still

bearing that cross with us and for us and in

us and through us. Jesus paid that cost for us,

and he continues to work in us. Because, I mean,

like, man, I don't know about you, I think that

he's the one who gives us the strength to die

to ourselves. That is not in my nature. And I

think that it is... Not in human nature. I'm

hoping that problem is not generic just to Ben

Smith. Because Jesus paid that cost, we can say,

Lord, I love you more than the rest of these

things. Will you help me love you more than the

rest of these things? And so this is kind of

getting to the point of what I believe is this

passage, because when I look at my life and I

look at things that maybe I have missed out on,

We'll say that in quotes, right? Because of my

love for Jesus, there has been sacrifices in

my life. Because I care more about following

Jesus than fulfilling whatever those things are.

But I don't care, right? So there's been a cost.

There's been things, and it was more obvious.

The cost was more obvious when I was younger.

when I was farther away from Jesus, when I was

beginning to leave my worldly life and I was

beginning to follow Jesus because as my desires

were changing, there's still that inkling of

going back that we all deal with, that we all

wrestle with. But the closer I get to Jesus,

the more those desires have changed and more

they are fulfilled in my relationship with Him.

I just had a conversation with a dude this morning

at the gym. It was a guy that has gone to our

church. He still says he goes to our church,

but he hasn't been in months. That kind of situation.

And his life just fell apart. I mean, just stuff

was happening, stuff was happening. And you could

see how broken he was. And he says, you know,

I ran back to smoking. I've been dealing with

my anxiety because I went back to smoking. And

you could see him wrestling and knowing that

it was not the right choice, not the right thing

to run to. But to see just him just having an

honest moment in the parking lot of Planet Fitness

was interesting. Praise God for it. Absolutely.

Because you know what he's doing. Yes. Even in

that conversation, dude's counting the cost.

Yes. That internal battle of weighing. what do

I do with the circumstances that I've been presented

with, the things that I'm wrestling with? I mean,

that's verse 33. Therefore, if any one of you

who does not renounce all he has cannot be my

disciple. And once again, I've heard that said,

like give everything up, live a life of abject

poverty, all those things. And maybe there is

some... That is the call that Jesus puts on.

I think there's some truth there, but yeah, but

continue. But what I think it really is, is be

willing to renounce whatever he asks of you,

whether that is easy or hard for you. If there's

something that you're not willing to give up

for Jesus, you really need to check your heart

on what that thing is. Well, that's idolatry.

It is heart, love, and worship in a different

direction. And worship can look a million different

ways standing with your hands raised on a Sunday.

It looks like what you give with your time. It

looks like what you give with your money. It

looks like what occupies your space. It looks

like what occupies your mind. And that's why

it looks so different for each person. Yes. Because

we each have those things that we enjoy that

are not... are in and of themselves, not sinful

things, but they could be things that if they

could, they could, they have the possibility

of holding a higher place. Um, and they don't

have to be physical things, but just hold a higher

place than God. And that's like, okay, as you

said, that thing has turned into idolatry. Yes.

And it has turned into idolatry for you. And

that's where we get into the area of like not

causing a brother or sister to stumble. Right.

Because there can be something that's completely

fine. And maybe even like we talked at the very

beginning, like, like I'm glorifying God through,

through enjoying and enjoying and thanking him

for it, that for another brother, it might be

really hard. Yeah. So, I mean, let's go back

to what the, I mean, the very first movie we

mentioned at the very beginning, good morning,

Vietnam. I don't even remember what that movie

is rated. Right. And that's why, I mean, I had

to put caveats on there, be like, okay, it. been

more than five years since I've watched this

movie. I might've been in a different spiritual

mindset when I watched this movie. I think it

was cool. I think it was a good movie, but like,

there might be someone that this listening to

this podcast, that's a brother in Christ that

just watched this yesterday and was like, Oh,

I should not have watched that. And then they

get on here and hear their pastor being like,

yeah, you should go watch that movie. It's like,

well, hold on. You know, that's what I'm saying.

Like there's, and then There's going to be these

things that, you know, say there's a certain

thing that's mentioned in that movie that's a

really big struggle for someone. Like, I'm not

trying to hurt their spiritual life. But that's

what, like, we want to make sure that we are

glorifying the Lord in everything we're doing.

Absolutely. Absolutely. There's one other contrast

I want to point out in this text. Yeah. From

25 to 33. So you had highlighted the difference

between a disciple and the crowds. Yes. Right?

So 25. Now great crowds accompanied him. We're

firmly in the, there are some faithful, there

are some curious, there are some whatever, right?

Crowds. 33, Jesus says, if any of you who does

not renounce all he has cannot be my disciple.

That's right. And discipleship, and I'm not necessarily

talking about like the you or me sitting down

with a younger believer. But the discipleship

is a process that we all undergo of learning

about Jesus. There's a pastor I respect who refers

to it as the way of Jesus. He always capitalizes

the W. I like the way it looks on paper. Discipleship

is a process. I don't know. I feel like when

we say, oh yeah, we're disciples of Jesus, we

treat it as a synonym for I've been saved. Yeah,

I see what you're saying. Like I have been made

a disciple and the discipleship process is done.

Look at me. I'm a disciple. I can wear the disciple

name tag. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Once you become a Christian, you begin the discipleship

process. So I have a really cool illustration

that I use with my students with this exact concept.

So I kind of even dropped a hint about this on

Sunday in my sermon when I talked about the word

sanctification. Right? Because there's a difference,

because I wanted to make sure that people were

clear, because we talked about how salvation

is through grace alone. Correct. Right? Like,

that is just a universal concept in Christianity.

Salvation is through grace alone. However, the

reason people talk about works so much is because

it is evidence through the sanctification process,

right? So, but here's... Are you a math guy?

Geometry. Do you remember geometry? Yes, I do.

I love geometry. Dude, so you remember? I liked

simple geometry. When I was just given an X coordinate

and a Y coordinate, and I put it on a map. When

they were giving you a shape with four sides,

and they're like, what is that? And you're like,

it's a square. That was the geometry I was good

at. When he started to have to learn sine and

cosine and things like that, and he started to

get into trigonometry geometry, no, I'm out.

Your boy is gone. I remember liking that, but

I don't remember anything that I learned in that

class. Well, good for you. I'm going back to

the simple part of geometry. In fact, I'm going

back to elementary school geometry, which is

why this illustration works so well. Here we

go. So do you remember that when you're plotting

points on a graph and there's two different points,

they had different terminology. And so like a

line has a dot, a dot, and there's a line going

between it. Yes. Right? Dot to dot. That's a

line. right? There's another terminology called

array. Yeah. All my students are familiar with

this terminology because like I said, elementary

school, whatever. And so array, there's a dot,

there is a definitive starting point, but the

line never ends. That is sanctification. Absolutely.

That is salvation. There is a time in your life.

Now, here's something very important that I need

to say to people like me. Okay. I don't have

a date. Yeah. I don't know the day I was saved.

Some people, some pastors, that'll trip them

up. If you don't know the time and the day that

you gave your life to Jesus, you need to check

your heart. Dude, even my salvation was a process.

Right. Because I didn't grow up in church, but

I started going to church as a teenager. I thought

I made the decision at 13, but I did not get

saved at 13. The Lord started working on my heart

at 13. And sometime between 13 and 18, the Lord

Jesus. absolutely transformed my life. You want

to know who else's salvation was a process? Yeah.

Peter. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. And, oh, I don't know,

Paul. Yeah. Like, that's, I get the, yeah. So

I want to be clear, even though I'm using that

term point, that's definitive on a graph, like,

for some of you, that doesn't necessarily mean

there's a date, time, location. Yeah, yeah. Now,

for some people, It is very much a pinpoint.

But so a ray, you've got the point, and then

it goes on forever. You see, the point is salvation.

The ray, the line that goes on forever is sanctification.

We are getting closer to Jesus for the rest of

our life. We absolutely are. And in that, I completely

understand the ray example. All I'll say is this,

man, there is a end. That line keeps going on,

and it is a ray, but that third of those terms,

sanctification, justification, sanctification,

glorification. We are going to get to land, and

that one's symbolized by an arrow going in both

directions with magnitude, baby! It's a quote

from Despicable Me. vector vector i was like

he's orange he wears glasses and i was like trying

to remember his name and i was just lost man

that that one's gonna fall flat tonight we steal

the moon tonight we steal the moon It is a good

movie. It is a good movie. We've been movie heavy

today. A little bit. A little bit. It was a movie

sandwich, if you will. A movie sandwich. We began

with movies. We had the beginning bread and the

ending bread and a whole lot of pursuing Jesus

in the middle. I love it. You know, that's what

we're here for, pursuing Jesus. Talking about

real things like movies. And sandwiches. And

sandwiches. And pursuing Jesus in, through, and

sometimes around those things. I have been Ben

Smith. I have still been Sean Griffin. And this

has been Pursuing Jesus. We will catch you guys

next week. Love y 'all. See y 'all next week.

Pursuing Jesus is a ministry of Memorial Baptist

Church in Norwood, North Carolina. To learn more

about our church, please visit memorial4norwood

.com.