Counting The Cost - Renovation of the Heart

Welcome to Trinity Sermons.

Here at Trinity Church, Streetsville,

we want to share with you messages that inspire

and encourage you in your faith journey,

as we learn together to love Jesus,

live like Jesus, and lead others to Jesus.

This is episode two of our sermon series,

Renovation of the Heart.

And today, we have Erikan Olaye with us,

where she will be exploring the cost that we pay

when we enter the church.

The cost that we pay when we invite Jesus

to reshape our hearts and remodel our lives.

Now, before we begin,

I'd like to invite you to follow our podcast,

check us out on social media,

and visit our website at trinitiestreetsville.org.

Thanks so much for listening, and we hope you enjoy.

God bless.

A reading from the Gospel of Mark,

chapter eight, verses 31 to 39.

He then began to teach them that the Son of Man

must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders,

the chief priests, and the teachers of the law,

and that he must be killed and after three days, rise again.

He spoke plenty about this, and Peter took him aside

and began to rebuke him.

But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples,

he rebuked Peter.

Get behind me, Satan, he said.

You do not have in mind the concerns of God,

but merely human concerns.

Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples

and said, whoever wants to be my disciple

must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.

For whoever wants to save their life will lose it.

Whoever loses their life for me and for the Gospel

will save it.

What good is it for someone to gain the whole world,

yet forfeit their soul?

Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

If anyone is ashamed of me and my words

in this adulterous and sinful generation,

the Son of Man will be ashamed of them

when he comes in his Father's glory with the holy angels.

The word of the Lord.

Amen.

Good morning, church family.

Good morning.

It is such a blessing to be here this morning,

standing to speak to you on the topic,

Counting the Costs, as part of the series

on the Renovation of the Heart.

I will start by giving thanks to God, of course.

He's just such a gracious God, so merciful and so faithful.

I appreciate him.

I also want to thank you for coming to church today.

Last week when Rob said,

next week we're going to be speaking about

counting the costs,

and Erica is going to be speaking to that.

I kind of had some concerns

because nobody wants to talk about costs at this time,

given how the cost of everything is rising.

And I was doubly concerned

because it wasn't going to be Pastor Rob speaking.

But I'm so happy you made it.

So again, I will also take this opportunity

to say what an amazing church this is.

And I'm so grateful for how hospitable you are.

It's just been amazing seeing how God is at work

in this church and how you extend the hospitality

that God has granted to you, to people like me.

I am so grateful to be a beneficiary of that.

Thank you.

Now, I'm also grateful to the pastor

for giving me the opportunity to leave you

for all the support they have given me.

And it's just been a great journey so far.

So, let's talk about costs.

As we saw in the video, renovating costs money.

There's a lot of tangible costs.

Things you can say, okay, it took me six months,

three months, you know, whatever time,

you can, that's tangible, or it cost me this much.

But then there are the intangibles as well.

The stress you go through, you're displaced.

You have to make decisions, just, you know,

that you always have to plan for contingencies.

Things happen that you did not plan for.

And that puts you under stress.

So there's a whole lot of that going on

when you're doing a physical renovation

of where you're living.

How about our hearts?

That is where our spirit resides.

That's where the Holy Spirit lives.

It's the same kind of concept.

There is a cost attached to that renovation.

And that's a renovation we actually have to do.

It's not the place we live in, we may choose not to do that,

but the one that is related to our hearts.

We do have to do that renovation every now and then.

And so in today's passage,

Jesus was speaking to his disciples,

and he told them, he was telling them,

I'm gonna suffer many things.

I'm going to be persecuted.

I will be killed and all of that.

And then Peter took him aside and rebuked him and said,

Jesus, please don't say such things,

because Peter was remembering that.

I have left my business.

I was a fisherman.

I folded it up and I started following you.

And why are you talking about dying?

Like, I've seen you, you know, do great things,

turn water into wine.

I've seen you heal the sick.

So it can only get better from here.

You know, Peter was like, Jesus, please don't say that.

And Jesus turned right back and rebuked him

and said, get behind me, Satan.

And then he said, you do not have the mind,

you do not have in mind the concerns of God,

but merely human concern.

And that's really what we're talking about today.

Jesus was at that point showing the difference

between how we as human beings think

and how we should be thinking, how Peter was thinking,

thinking about the things that concern him.

And he was saying, what I am here about is,

or for is to do the will of God.

And you should be thinking about the will of God.

So renovations do have a cost, as we have seen.

And at the time, Jesus turned around and spoke to Peter

and rebuked him.

And then Jesus said, this is what I am about.

I am about the will of God.

Now notice that Jesus was speaking to his disciples.

So if you're here today and you think,

well, I have been following Jesus for a long time,

I don't have to think about cost, well, it is for you.

Because Peter had been following him,

and yet he still had to learn about costs.

Or maybe you are here and you're,

or you've joined us online and you feel,

well, thank goodness, I am just here for the first time

or the second or the third time.

So this is for the disciples, not for me.

It's also for you.

Because what I love about Jesus is that

you get to know everything upfront,

no hidden costs, no hidden fees, no small prints.

You know what you're getting into.

And so it's for all of us.

And what are the costs that Jesus outlined?

He said, if you want to be my disciple,

you must deny yourself, you must take up your cross

and follow.

Okay, so what does it mean to deny ourselves?

Denying ourselves basically means we have to prioritize

the will of God over our will.

It means that we have to surrender what gives us pleasure.

If it is not in line with God's will,

we have to surrender it and take on

what is in line with God's will.

It means that we have to align our thoughts,

our worries, our life perspectives,

our goals and ambitions with the word of God,

with the word of God, with His will

and with His wants for us.

If you're a parent or you have a dependent

or you have a spouse, you would have a concept

of not always having things done the way you wanted

or of not always fulfilling your desires.

You'll have the concept of always factoring

in some other person.

In this case, we're not just factoring in God,

we are giving Him our all.

That's the cost of being a disciple.

We may face challenges and hardships, we will actually.

And we will experience situations

where we have to make hard decisions.

I'm sure Libby and Scott have had to make

some difficult decisions as they have renovated their house.

They've had to choose this one over that one.

And that's what we're gonna have to do.

We may have to put in more time to study the Bible.

We may have to put in more money

into things that concern the gospel.

We may have to yield our talent a little bit more.

That's the cost of following Jesus.

We may face opposition and setbacks.

People may laugh at us, they may scorn.

They may say, I know you.

They may not want you to forget your past.

They may want to bring your past

and make it a hindrance to your future.

But Jesus says, whosoever wields.

So it's for all of us.

And the next cost is

that of taking up our cross.

What is our cross?

What is your cross?

Your cross is pretty much the heart you have,

the pain, those things that cause you shame.

Those things you don't want to talk about.

Jesus is not saying leave them and run away.

He's saying take them up and follow me.

Bring it.

Don't leave it.

Contend with it.

Fight the good fight of faith

until there's a godly resolution to that situation.

So we take our cross daily and we follow him.

And the last part of it is actually following him.

Walking in his footsteps,

walking in obedience to his word.

Loving others unconditionally.

That's the trademark of our church.

Standing up for what is right.

Standing in the same corner with the underdog.

That's what it takes to follow Jesus.

That's what it takes to follow Jesus.

Well, you may say the cost is too high.

Is there a discount?

I'm so sorry, no, there's no discounts here.

See, we don't want to end up with a structure

that looks like that.

I'm sure there was some cost involved

in putting up the structure,

but obviously there wasn't much thought given to it.

And maybe some corners were cut,

and I am looking at it and I'm wondering

how will the car get into the garage?

Oh, no.

But look at it this way.

Jesus would never ask us to do what he himself has not done.

He would never ask us to do

what he has not shown us how to do.

And that's really what he was saying in Mark chapter eight,

verse 31, at the beginning of the passage,

when he said, I have come,

this is gonna happen to me, I'm gonna be rejected.

I'm going to end up dying and rising after two days.

He was teaching us that I am going to pay the cost

for reconciliation to the Father.

And all I'm asking is,

follow along the same lines,

be willing to deny yourself.

The same way I denied my glory

and I came down to walk amongst you,

you need to be able to deny yourself.

You need to be able to take up your cross,

your responsibility, and be willing to follow me.

We have to pay the costs.

We may not be able to complete the responsibility,

we may not be able to complete the renovation all at once,

we're all a walk in progress.

But the little area we're able to renovate,

it's good enough.

And so we ask ourselves,

with all the stock of costs, what's the benefit?

Is there anything in this for me?

Is there any good news?

Yes, absolutely there is.

Because each time we're talking about costs,

we're also talking about value.

We're talking about what we get

at the end of that cost process.

And the kind of value we are going to get

from working with Jesus is,

number one, we're going to have a very spacious home in our hearts.

When we renovate our hearts,

we're going to have enough space for the Holy Spirit

to move in and be comfortable there.

And when the Holy Spirit comes in,

He comes in with all the good things

He always goes along with.

Righteousness, peace, joy in the Holy Ghost.

He comes in with abundant life.

He comes in with good relationships.

He comes in with a lot of things.

And then we're going to have greater intimacy with God.

We're going to be transformed and be more like Christ.

We're going to have the gift of eternal life

to look forward to.

And we're going to be prepared for better impactful living,

which again is what we love to do in this church,

to impact others positively.

And so, what kind of impact are we talking about?

Our families will be impacted

by the renovations we make to our hearts.

Our communities, we will have better relationships.

And indeed, our world will be positively impacted.

So, following Jesus is the ultimate destination

of our hearts renovation.

It is a lifelong journey of discipleship

marked by obedience, faithfulness, intimacy with God.

When we follow Jesus, we walk in His footsteps,

we're guided by His teachings.

We allow His love to shape our hearts

and His truth to renew our minds

and His Spirit to empower us.

We discover the abundant life that He has promised.

So, it is my prayer that we will be encouraged

and we will find the courage and conviction

to embark on this transformative journey,

knowing that He who has started a good work in us,

He is faithful to complete it.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for joining us,

and we hope you found the sermon today positive and inspiring.

The sermon today was taken from the June 18th, 2023 service

here at Trinity Church, Streetsville in Mississauga, Ontario.

Please take a minute now to rate and review our podcast

as we would love to hear your feedback.

And don't forget to come back next week,

and thanks again for joining us.