Disciple

Again, welcome. My name's Chris. If you don't know me, I'm a teaching pastor here at Watermark.

And we're going to be starting a new series today. If you've got, has everyone picked up

one of these little things? This is going to be helping us to think about, you can stick this in

your bathroom, you can stick this anywhere in your home. This is going to be a reminder for you

of some of the things we're going to be talking about as this series. And just to help that,

just to really inform and shape the way that we view ourselves. When I was a kid, I went to church

quite a lot. And the people at my church, they were nice, okay? They were kind of nice people,

nice church people. And every Sunday I'd meet them and then I'd say hi to them. And they would come

and say hi back. And we'd all be very pleasant. And then afterwards, they'd go away, go off to

their life. I'd go off to my life. And then next Sunday would happen and we'd say hi to each other.

And we'd be very pleasant to each other. And everyone seemed sorted. Everyone seemed kind of

nice. And then right into our middle class, kind of nice middle class church, came a few different

people who didn't quite fit in. There was an ex-football hooligan. There was some ex-drug addicts.

There was a gym owner who was kind of pretty rough. And everyone in their nice kind of middle class way

avoided them. Or just kind of had very polite conversation and then tried very quickly to

kind of move off to the people they were comfortable with. But there was one thing that was different.

My parents didn't do that. My parents, they actually invited them to come over to our house for Sunday lunch.

Every Sunday, we would have random people come into our home just for lunch. Sometimes my dad would do a

Bible study with them. We had all these kind of interesting characters coming in and out of my home.

And people asked me, are your parents pastors?

Because, you know, pastors do that kind of thing. And I'd say, no. My parents just teach us ordinary

people. And I stopped to think about why people would think that only pastors would do that kind

of thing. And I realized that for many of us, the idea of Christianity, of what we read in the Bible,

of a radical discipleship, which changes the way we focus on our priorities in life, which for many of

us seems very scary, is actually when you read the Bible, this is what life is all about. And our modern

Christianity often does not mirror what Jesus calls us to. You know, we've reduced discipleship to an

eight-week course that you do. Christianity becomes very manageable. You know, sacrifice means giving up

chocolate at Lent. Okay? And what I notice in my own life, and I think in the life of the church,

is that even for us, we've been through a period of transition. And when you go through a period of

transition, like rocking on a boat, what happens? You want to hold on to the rails of comfort and

security and stability in your life. We want to stay with the people we know. We want to be comfortable

with the things that we feel okay with. We want to stay safe without taking gospel risks.

And yet, Jesus is going to say to us, this year in our lives, I don't want you to stay safe.

I want you to come and follow me. I want to stretch you in ways that you could never have imagined that

are going to be stretched, so that your faith will grow in ways that you could never imagine your faith

could grow. And so this year, what we want to do is, we want to root ourselves in the truth,

biblical, theological truth, to get us deep down in the roots. You know, like we talked about the vine

last week, to really understand, get the sap of God's word flowing into us, so that we can be people

who learn how to bear fruit as we're trying to follow along with Christ and make disciples of other

people. That's why, who was there at the CG together on Friday? Yeah, it was great. If you weren't there,

you need to come this Friday. We had just an amazing time. There was amazing food. There was, and we just

said it was a great time, because what we're trying to do with the CG together, we've pulled the community

groups for five weeks intentionally, because we see this as a crucial time for us to really get back

at the heart of what it means to be disciples of Jesus, and also, how do we help others to become

disciples of Jesus? So we want to be shaping our community life. That's why we want you to be there

on Friday nights for the next few weeks, because this is a time where we want to shape the way we're

living as a church, and really learning how to do what God calls us to do. Does that make sense?

Father, your word is powerful. I pray that your word would speak to us. I pray that we wouldn't

just be people who hear your word, but people who do your word. I pray that you would show us Jesus,

and let us live in the light of how beautiful you are, and learn to follow you with where you're

going. In Jesus' name, amen. Okay, so if you have your passage open with you,

the series we're going to look at, if you, do you know those new scanners at airports, you know,

where you have to put all your hand on them? You know, you've got to put all your fingers

on the scanner just to verify your ID. Well, what we're looking at over the next five weeks

is five different biblical titles which show what our identity is as Christians to show us and help

us to see what it means to follow Jesus in our lives. And you need all of them to understand what

your ID is. And so that's why we have this, to kind of remind you of some of those things. So we're

going to look today at disciple. Then we're going to look at saint, family, servant, ambassador,

and because I'm perverse, I'm going to add another one as well, which is member. Okay, but we're going

to go for the five key ones to start with. So today we're looking at disciple. Okay, disciple. It's a

strange word. We don't use it very often, but my definition of a disciple is this. Someone who is

growing in trusting Jesus as Savior and growing in lovingly obeying him as Lord in every part of life.

Okay? Growing in trusting him as your Savior and growing in lovingly obeying him as your Lord.

Okay? In every aspect of your life. And what I want to do today is just kind of unpack that a little

bit and looking at the passages that we have. And I just wanted to say, just to point out,

that word growing. Because being a disciple is about a journey. It's not a destination.

It's a journey which starts with a call, which has then a cost, and it takes place on a mission.

So we're going to look at the call, the cost, the fuel for responding, and then the mission that he

calls us on. Okay? So Mark chapter one. You see the scene. Jesus, before this has come. He's announced

that the kingdom of God has arrived. He's called everybody to repent and believe. And it seems like

we're on the crest of something amazing about to happen. Maybe there's miracles. Maybe there's

healings. Maybe incredible things are going to happen. And then Jesus goes down by the lake of Galilee

Galilee and calls some fishermen to follow him. And it seems a bit like an anticlimax if you actually

read through Mark. Because Mark is telling us, though, that if you want to see what God's kingdom

looks like, it starts in the call of Jesus to ordinary people like you and me. You see, he comes up and he

sees Andrew and Simon. And they're in the middle of fishing. Okay? They were fishermen. Now, I don't

know if you know about fishing in the first century, but being a fisherman in the first century was a

good job. Okay? Because basically, fish was in massive demand in the Roman Empire. It was the food of

choice. Okay? If you have rice here, it was fish there. And so the fishing business was a great business to be in.

Okay? And we know from Luke chapter 5 that James and John were also business partners with Simon

Luke 5 · chapter mention

and Andrew together. And so they're running their own little SME. It's a little family business. Okay?

Together. And they've got hired servants. They've got employees. Okay? So this business seems to be

doing pretty well. And scholars even think that after Jesus' resurrection, you see Peter, who

Simon, who's later called Peter, goes fishing again. Okay? Do you know that story after his

resurrection? And so they think that actually he still is running his fishing business even while

he's going out discipling as a disciple of Jesus because he still has his own boat and things are

still going on. So you see Simon, they've got his fishing business. But then you also see he's got his

own house. That's in verse 29. It's not in your bulletin. And his mother-in-law was staying with

him. Okay? Just imagine what that was like. And so Peter's married. James and John, later on we find

out they have an embarrassing tiger mom who comes up to Jesus and says, can you make my sons sit at your

right hand and left hand? And they're going, no. Why do you have to say that, mom? That's the kind of

families they were. These people, if you look at them, they're just ordinary people like you and me

who have got families, they've got homes, they've got jobs, they've got careers, they're just trying

to get on in life. Ordinary people. Not super Christians. Not super people. But in their ordinary

world, Jesus comes and he calls them. And he calls them. And he says, follow me.

Follow me. Now, you've got to understand the significance of what he is saying when he says,

follow me. Because in Jewish culture, basically the way that education worked was like this.

Until you were about 13, young Jewish boys would go to a local synagogue, the school there, and they

would learn what's called the Torah, which is the first five books of the Bible. In fact, they wouldn't

just learn them. They'd memorize them. Okay? So you look at your Bible, look at the first five books,

they had them down, memorized by the age of 10 to 13. After that, what would happen was that most kids

would then just go off to be an apprentice in their family's business. That's probably what happened to

Andrew and Simon and James and John. But then the brightest kids, okay, would then go on to further

study, learning the rabbis' traditions and things like that. And then after 17, and by the way,

they would have memorized the whole of the Old Testament by then. Okay? You get a little picture.

This is more than Hong Kong education going on here. Okay? And then by the age of about 17,

most people would go off to work, get married, do all the normal things. But then the most elite,

brightest of the bright students would go and look for a rabbi, a teacher, who would then go and be

able to train them to become the kind of people who really knew and lived out the Word of God.

And what would happen is they would go and ask the rabbi, can I be your disciple?

And the rabbi would basically give them the equivalent of like an interview. Like he would

grill them on all the kinds, it's like an entrance exam to get into Harvard or Cambridge. He would just

grill them with all these kind of questions to see whether they're suitable or not to be his disciple.

And if he thought they were bright enough, what he would do, he would then say to them at the end of

it, follow me. Follow me. And what that meant was, come with me as my disciple and submit to the

authority of my teaching in your life and let it shape every part of your life. Because the rabbi was

this ultimate example of someone who'd saturated his life so much with the scripture and was following

God that the disciples wanted to learn not just stuff about the Bible, they wanted to see

how he lived it out in his life. And they would then imitate him. So the really interesting thing is,

they were so devoted to their rabbi that they would copy everything he did. So if he walked with a limp,

you could tell who his disciples were because they'd start walking with a limp. If you like baseball,

they'd like baseball. In fact, we even see stories of a disciple hiding in a rabbi's bedroom to see how he

made love to his wife so he could learn later on. Okay? This was serious. You know, this isn't a

five-week course in, okay, come and be a disciple. This was a whole life commitment. Because their

rabbi was their master, was their lord. And if the rabbi's father, sorry, if the disciple's father

needed help at the same time as the rabbi, do you know who he would prioritize?

The rabbi would come first.

That's the level of commitment.

He's saying,

it's a totally new set of priorities you have when you follow me.

And what Jesus does here is absolutely revolutionary, though.

Because he doesn't wait for his disciples to be good enough, to kind of pass the test.

You see, what he does, out of pure grace, he comes out to them.

Do you see that? He initiates the call to them right where they are.

And he says, follow me.

And when he's doing that, he's giving them the highest privilege available to them

without any entrance requirements except come and trust me and obey me.

That's what he's saying.

You know, it's the ultimate apprenticeship.

When I was young,

one of my guitar heroes,

and I've said this before, was a guy called Van Halen.

Who here knows who Van Halen is?

Okay, there's some educated people.

Obviously, the rest of you,

it just shows the lack of education that there is here.

So go home after this,

and go on YouTube Van Halen.

You'll see somebody who knows how to play the guitar.

Okay?

But when I was learning guitar,

what I would do,

I would go down and I'd get these books

which had tabulated all the music in them.

And as I was learning,

there'd be these songs,

songs which I didn't know.

And some of them would buy this guy called Van Halen.

And you know,

I'd try and kind of work out what some of the notes were

and things like that.

But I didn't know what it sounded like

until one day,

I got a VHS videotape.

There was no internet in those days.

Of Van Halen playing.

And my goodness,

I was stunned.

It was like,

this was guitar playing as I had never heard it before.

And I was going,

I want to know how to play like that.

And you see,

I had got the book there

which showed the notes,

but I couldn't fully understand

how to play like him

until I actually saw him playing.

Until I actually saw him

and saw how he operated.

And then I was like,

I want to study this guy.

I want to know how to do it like he does it.

I want to play like that.

That's actually the call of a disciple

is actually to say,

I want to learn Jesus.

I want to,

because he lives life

like nobody else lives life.

He's compassionate and yet bold.

He's strong and yet humble.

He's everything you want to be.

And so he says,

I want to learn Jesus.

Come and follow me

and learn me with every fiber of your being.

Learn to play life like I play life.

And the thing is,

if Van Halen personally came into the room

and said,

follow me,

man, I'd be there.

But he hasn't done that.

And I don't think he's ever going to do that.

But the amazing grace

of the call of Jesus

is that he has called

each one of you personally

to come and be his disciple.

And the thing is,

that is grace.

You didn't deserve it,

didn't earn it,

that's grace.

But when we dumb down Christianity

to say,

just pray a prayer,

believe that Jesus died

to forgive you for your sins,

go to church every Sunday,

be a good person,

pray occasionally

to kind of get some help,

and then you'll go to heaven,

we're not talking about

biblical Christianity there.

That is not the call

of to be a Christian.

Because if Jesus is actually

the creator of the universe,

the savior of all,

as the Bible claims,

just think about it.

The nearest star

is about 4.26 light years away

to us,

other than the sun,

it's the nearest one.

And to get to that star

with the shuttle Voyager 1

traveling at 36,000 kilometers an hour,

it would take us

over 70,000 years

to get there.

Okay?

How long am I going to live?

Well, 70, 80, 90 years maybe.

And if you think

that that star

is only just a speck

in the whole of the universe,

and if Jesus is really creator

of all of that,

are we seriously suggesting

that we invite him

into our lives

just to be our personal assistant

to kind of help us out

in trouble?

When Jesus calls,

it's his incredible grace.

But when he calls,

his call is for you

to center your entire life

around him.

It's like how you parent,

how you approach your work,

your family,

your relationships.

It's a totally new priority

in every area of your life.

That's the call of a disciple.

And you see Simon,

Andrew,

James,

John,

they leave immediately

to follow him.

They see the privilege.

That's the call.

What about the cost?

What about the cost?

I discovered last week

in talking to a guy

who's an ex-headhunter

that good headhunters,

when looking for someone

for a post,

they approach somebody,

they invite them

to come and have the job,

and then they pull the offer away

and say,

hmm,

I'm not sure you're the right person

for this job.

And if the person says,

no, no, no, no, no,

I really want this job,

they know that that is

the right person

to come and have the job.

They know they really want it.

And now Jesus does

a little bit of the same

kind of thing

because he says,

in Luke 9,

he says,

if anyone wishes

to come after me,

let them deny themselves,

take up their cross,

and follow me.

Whoever wishes

to save his life

will lose it.

Whoever loses their life

for my sake

will save it.

But what does it profit a man

if he gains the whole world

but loses or forfeits himself?

You see,

what he's saying is,

if you want to follow me,

you've got to count the cost.

Because where do you

follow Jesus to?

Where's Jesus going?

The whole of Luke,

the Bible story,

is actually Jesus

is heading to the cross.

And what does the cross represent?

The cross represents

everything in our culture

that we want to avoid,

which is death.

And so what he's saying is,

if you want to find yourself,

you don't find yourself

by eat, pray, love.

Okay?

You find it

in dying to yourself.

Now that's not a very

popular message.

The guy,

Dietrich Bonhoeffer,

who was a guy

in the Second World War,

he had a safe career

in the U.S.,

but he chose to go back

to his home in Germany

to help people there

because of this call.

And he said this,

when Christ calls a man

or a woman,

he bids him come and die.

If grace cost God

the life of his son,

what has cost God much

cannot be cheap for us.

Wow.

You know,

Luke tells us

that this cost,

this dying,

is not a suicide mission.

This is a daily death.

Every single day,

the disciple is learning

how to die to himself

and how to walk with Jesus.

You see,

when you seek to save your life,

we're trying to gain

everything for ourselves.

We're trying to make ourselves

as the first priority.

And he's saying,

denying yourselves

is denying you

as the number one

and saying,

Jesus,

you're going to be number one.

You know,

it's not dying to fun.

Some people,

you know,

they take this

and it's like,

okay,

we never have fun.

You know,

Jesus is accused

of being a party animal.

You know that?

He turns water into wine.

Okay?

He knows how to have a good time.

It's not that.

No,

you're dying to be

on the throne of your life.

You're dying to find

your identity

in anything other than Jesus.

Do you see what the,

Andrew and Simon,

they leave behind their nets.

There's fish there.

There's money to be made there.

And they're saying,

my world is not going

to be centered.

My identity is not going

to be centered around

just getting stuff for me.

James and John,

they leave their father,

their family.

And yet,

it's not that everyone

has to leave their jobs

to be a disciple.

The call is different

for every person,

but the call in one sense

is the same,

which is,

find your identity in me

and make me number one

with whatever context

I've placed you in.

Because you see,

Simon seems to keep

his fishing business going,

but there's a radical shift

in his priorities

and where his comfort

is found

and his hope is found

and his security is found.

You know,

when you come home

in the evening

and all you want to do

is put your feet up

and watch TV,

but your spouse needs

the dishes to be washed,

what does it mean

to die to yourself?

When,

like,

for me,

I was just very convicted

by this,

just this week

thinking about this passage.

Procrastination.

Anyone good at procrastinating?

There's a few.

I am.

You know what I procrastinate

and I procrastinate

on administrative things.

Okay?

If there's a list

of ten things I've got to do

and there's stuff to do

with like banks

or internet companies,

all that kind of stuff,

that's going down

right at number ten

on my priority list.

And yet,

it affects others

when I don't do

those things on time.

God says to me,

if you want to take up

your cross daily,

one of the things

you need to do

is start putting

those administrative tasks

higher up your list

out of love

because your procrastination

is simply self-seeking,

comfort-seeking,

you being on the throne

of your life.

And a disciple

is willing to die

to their comfort

for Christ's sake

and for others' sake.

C.S. Lewis said,

keep back nothing.

Nothing in you

that has not died

will ever be raised

from the dead.

Look for yourself

and you will find

in the long run

only hatred,

loneliness,

despair,

rage,

ruin,

and decay.

But look for Christ

and you'll find him.

And with him,

everything else

thrown in.

And he's saying,

die to yourself,

you'll find yourself

because you'll find

the true life in me.

There are three people

Jesus meets on the road.

It's really interesting

if you actually look

at how discipleship works.

Go through the Gospels

and you see how Jesus does it.

It's really interesting.

Three people.

And one person says,

hey, I'm going to follow you

wherever you go.

And Jesus says to him,

foxes have holes,

birds of the air have nests,

son of man has nowhere

to lay his head.

And he's saying,

okay,

are you sure?

I'm not the kind of savior

who's just the kind of

political campaign manager here.

Let me bring this down

to your level,

he's saying.

Okay,

you have a home,

you've got a nice

standard of living.

Are you willing

to lay that down for me?

Or are you just going

to put that before me?

That's what he's saying.

Are you willing

for people to not invite you in

because they know

that you follow me?

That's what he's saying

to this guy.

He calls another guy,

he says,

follow me.

But his reaction

is different.

He says,

let me first bury my father.

Which makes you wonder

why he wasn't burying him

beforehand,

but anyway.

And another,

he says,

let me first say farewell

to those who are at home.

And notice that

in each of the occasions

he says,

let me first.

You see that?

Because he's saying,

listen guys,

I know that our culture

tells us family comes first.

But when I call you,

I come first.

That's hard.

But that's what he's saying.

And some of us know

the opposition from family

when you've chosen

to trust in Christ

and the toughness

and the cost of that.

But you only sacrifice,

you're only willing

to pay that cost

for something

that is truly precious

to you.

If Christ is precious

to you,

you'll pay that cost.

You know,

some of us,

when we were single,

didn't even know

that 5am existed.

And then you got married

and had kids.

Right?

And, you know,

I was speaking to someone

last week

and they said,

hey, I'm just exhausted

from bringing out my kids

and everything.

But my kids bring me

so much joy.

I wouldn't trade it in

for the world.

And you're looking at them

and thinking,

really?

But because

they're not sacrificing

everything in their life

just to kind of

cut themselves off.

No, it's because

they love their kids.

And they want

their relationship with them.

That's what drives them.

You know,

if you prioritize

the wrong things in life,

even if you prioritize

your kids above Jesus,

when things go wrong,

you'll be stressing

and you'll transfer

that stress

onto your kids.

And the greatest way

to disciple your kids

is for you

to be learning

how to be a disciple

of Jesus.

But what denying yourself

means is this.

My focus is not

on the denial.

My focus is on the one

that I'm following.

So it's focused

with your kids.

It's on your kids,

not the cost.

And when we focus

and follow Jesus,

we're not just focusing

on, oh, look at all

the costs I've got to pay.

No, we're focusing

on Christ.

And every day

you're going to have

choices whether you

choose to die

or live for him.

Whether you choose

for self or you live

for him every day

and he says,

follow me.

Count the cost.

I've called you

and I'm going to

change you to be

who I've called you to be.

So that's it.

The call,

the cost.

First,

thirdly,

the fuel.

Being a disciple

is not an option.

Did you get that?

If you're a Christian,

there's not this two-tier

kind of,

here's the really

keen Christians

and here's just

the ordinary Christians.

He says,

no, no, no,

everyone is called

to be a disciple.

There's no kind

of get out clause.

But here's the thing.

You never earn

God's love

by being a committed

disciple.

people.

Jesus doesn't say,

follow me

and then I'll die

for you.

He says,

I'm going to the cross

now for you,

now follow me.

And do you know,

here's the interesting

thing.

When you're really

committed,

when you commit

to a cause,

what often happens,

if you're really

hardcore,

you become hard

on yourself

and you become hard

on the people

around you.

Okay?

Think of how

terrorism works.

people who are

fanatical for

something become

very harsh towards

other people.

The story,

which is not in

your bulletin,

but just before

him meeting those

three guys,

James and John,

who had left

everything to follow

Jesus,

they enter with

Jesus into a

Samaritan village.

And the Samaritan

village rejects them,

tells them to get

out.

And Jesus has no

place to lay his

head as he told

the others.

And it's

interesting,

James and John,

recalling an Old

Testament example

of Elijah,

they say,

basically,

let's call down

fire on that

village in

judgment.

They're hard,

because they're

committed and

these guys are

just wasters.

Do you know

what Jesus does?

He rebukes them

and says,

that's not the way

we roll around

here.

He says,

if anyone wants

to save their

life, yeah,

they'll lose it.

If you don't

follow me on

judgment day,

you'll forfeit

everything you

wanted to keep.

But for the

Samaritans who

had wanted to

keep themselves

as their

priority,

Jesus is saying,

I'm not going

to send fire

on them now.

Why?

Because I'm

going to take

the fire of

God's judgment

on myself.

Because that's

where I'm headed

to the cross.

You see,

Jesus is so

much more tender

and gentle

than often we

can be with

other people.

And in a

world where,

you know,

we're so

suspicious of

leaders with

too much

power because

they're all about

self-interest

grabbing for

themselves and

then they create

cultures where

everyone in the

workplace is trying

to throw other

people under the

bus so that they

can get themselves

promoted.

Jesus says,

I'm a leader who's

willing to lay down

my life for even

the most hard-hearted,

mistake-ridden,

sin-infested

person.

Like the

Samaritans,

he's willing to

be shot down for

your hard-heartedness

on the cross because

he's so committed to

your good.

He's so committed.

And if you have

someone who you

know loves you that

much, a boss who

would be willing to

take the hit for

you, isn't that

somebody you're

willing to undying

loyalty to?

Because you know,

in Acts, after

Jesus is raised

from the dead, he

sends, the gospel

is to go out.

Do you remember

from the Acts

series where the

gospel goes?

It goes from

Jerusalem to,

what does it go

next?

Judea to

Samaria.

Isn't that

interesting?

You see, the

same people who

had rejected

Jesus, he

sends out his

word again to

call them back to

himself because

that's the kind of

God he is who

keeps calling again

and again because

he longs to show

you grace.

The gospel call

goes out to us.

He is gracious

beyond compare.

He calls us to

obedience.

Just as my name is

Chris Thornton and

you can't say, hey,

I'd like to have

Chris but I don't

think I want

Thornton.

So you can't say, I

want Jesus as my

savior but I don't

want to have him as

my lord.

But when you get

Jesus as your lord,

you get a gracious

lord.

Who is the kind of

lord you want to have

as a leader?

And some of us

here, Jesus is

calling you today

and you've been

wavering, you've been

staying in the boat

of your own comfort,

wondering whether you're

going to commit or not

to Jesus.

There are things that

are attractive to you,

around you,

careers,

relationships,

money, all those

things and that's where

your focus has been.

And Jesus is saying

to you,

will you see how

much I'm worth

following?

Come and follow me

today.

Some of us have been

Christians for a long

time and it's almost

like we've kind of,

we've followed him,

we heard his call but

then we walked kind of,

we'd like to get back

into the boat a little

bit because we want to

just be safe.

Life is busy,

things are challenging

and Jesus says,

I'm humble,

I'm gentle but I've

died for you

so trust me now

and start following me

again as your Lord

and your Savior.

It's grace that he

calls us

but he bids us

count the cost.

The fuel

to be obedient

is to know

the grace that he

has given to us

as a gracious Savior

and the final thing

is the mission.

the mission.

You cannot be a

disciple of Jesus

without being on

his mission

to make disciples

of others.

He says to his

disciples,

follow me

and I will make

you fishers,

I will make you

become fishers of

men.

You've got to

understand that's

a phrase which is

taken from the book

of Jeremiah chapter

Jeremiah 16 · chapter mention

16 where God

calls fishers

to catch people

and it's a sign

of judgment.

It's catching those

who are running

away from God

and ready bringing

them for judgment

but Jesus says hey

I'm not coming to

catch people for

judgment,

I'm coming to

save people.

And Jesus says

if you want to

follow me

I want to make you

somebody who reaches

out to others.

When you saturate

yourself in who I am

get to know me,

love me,

see how beautiful

I am.

What's going to

happen is I'm going

to stretch you.

I'm going to

call you to do

things which you

think you could

never possibly do.

If you think your

life is manageable

Jesus says I want

to make it so only

I can do the

things in you.

He wants to give

you a call so

big that it

feels overwhelming

but what he does

is he's going to

say graciously I'm

going to take you

step by step,

day by day,

to be this person

who influences

and impacts

other people

in your life.

And when we

mess up

we're going to

learn to trust

Jesus as our

savior again

and that's going

to fuel us

to obey him.

But if I gave

a five year old

the Van Halen

music

and said I want

you to go and

play it

it's impossible.

I couldn't play

it.

And when you

hear Jesus

play and you

see what he's

like you look

at it and you

just say wow I

can't do that.

But you know how

do you learn to

play a piece of

music?

You take it one

phrase by phrase

by phrase and

what you do is you

learn the one

phrase and then

you learn another

one and then you

keep practicing

that first phrase

keep practicing

do the next one

and then sometimes

you go back

because you've

forgotten the first

one and you

just kind of do

that step by step

by step by step

by step by step

and eventually

you learn how to

play the piece of

music which you

thought was

impossible to

play.

That's the journey

of discipleship that

God has you and

me on.

He's got this big

call and some of

us say I don't

know how to do

it and he's

going to say I'm

going to take you

step by step.

And when we do

kind of dud notes

on there he says

just come back in

repentance come back

and trust me but

he says my call to

you is I want to

make you a disciple

maker.

And I want to

just kind of leave

us with a couple

of things.

I want to leave

us with a couple

of steps to think

about because I

don't like giving

just steps to do

because the danger

with steps is people

think that loving

Jesus is just about

following a series

of steps.

No it's actually

about coming into

relationship with

Jesus and learning

him.

But here's a couple

of things which I

think can be helpful

to help us to think

what does it mean

for me to be somebody

as a disciple

learning Jesus

to now become

someone who can

make disciples of

others.

So here's a little

diagram and I don't

have time to go

through all of this.

So I'm just going to

kind of give you a

teaser and then we'll

come and look at it

again.

The first stage if you

want to make a

disciple is you've

got to engage with

somebody.

that means and here's

tricky it means saying

hi to somebody.

Okay did you get

that?

Saying hi it means

going up to somebody

on a Sunday going up

to somebody in your

office going up to

somebody on the bus

wherever you are just

praying say God who do

you want me to say hi

to and then going up to

somebody and just

engaging with them.

For some of us that is

actually scary.

because we only stick

with the people we're

comfortable with.

I'm an introvert or

whatever it is.

But sometimes if God

as you know always

God tells you follow

me maybe you need to

die to your comfort and

move out of your

comfort zone and say

hi to somebody.

It's not complicated.

But maybe some of us

we're fine at doing

that.

No problem.

We've got relationships

with people with

Christians and non

Christians.

We're in that.

Then we've actually got

to understand how do we

invite people into that

next stage in the

relationship.

Because some of them

we've never invited

people.

I remember once having

dinner in the UK and a

Jehovah's Witness came

to our door.

And I had a friend over

for dinner and I was

like hey he actually got

up to go to the door.

I said hey tell him we're

not interested.

We're going to come

back.

I said he's not even

to come back.

Okay.

And he then went to the

door opened it up and

said hey come in.

And he said come down

have some dinner with

us.

And we started sharing

and just saying hey we're

Christians and this and

I was like yeah we're

Christians.

And he was kind of

sharing a little bit and

just getting them to share

a little bit about their

lives.

And after a while he

said hey yeah come back

again.

Here's my house.

And he and he and

after that he said to

me you know do you know

why I did that?

He said you know as

Christians we often just

try and blank out people

in our lives.

The kind of guys we don't

want to we don't want to

see in our lives.

And we don't see that

actually the most

effective way to reach

people is to love them.

And sometimes you have

to just invite people in

to your world.

To go for coffee.

To come for a meal.

To go hiking.

To do something.

To come to church.

To go to your CG.

You invite them in.

So they can see your life.

And in that context you

can then ask about them.

You can ask about what

they think about faith.

You can share what you

think about faith.

But in a context where

you're not just giving

them kind of here's your

four spiritual laws and

then running away.

But they're seeing like a

disciple sees Jesus.

They're seeing a life

lived out.

And you're asking them

questions.

Getting curious about

people.

If some of you struggle

with inviting people

maybe God is going to

say to you.

Come and die.

Get out of your

comfort zone.

Who's that person in

your office?

Who's that person in the

church?

Who's that person that you

need to reach out to?

That you know is there.

But you've never taken

the next step.

There's plenty more I

could say.

But I won't go on for

the rest.

First, Jesus calls us to

costly discipleship.

It's a call of grace to

become like him.

It's a costly grace.

But it's one that he

fuels with his power so

that as we go out we can

go and make disciples of

others and he gets the

glory.

Let's pray.

Let's pray.

I want you to stop and

think.

Where is God calling me

to come and die?

Maybe you're at a point

you realize that the

whole of your life is

actually just wrapped up

with a whole lot of

things which are about

you.

Jesus is calling you

right now.

Will you hear his

call?

Some of you, you do

the right things, you

follow the right things

but you've never even

thought about being the

people around you.

Jesus says, okay, who's

that one person that this

week you need to take a

step?

You need to say hi to

them.

You need to invite them to

something.

You need to pray and say,

God, help me to engage

with them.

Take a step out of the

boat.

Maybe you need to ask

them, what do you

actually think about

Christianity?

You've been in a

relationship for so long

with them but you've

never asked.

Maybe that's your step.

Maybe you've never

shared what you do on a

Sunday.

Maybe that's your step.

Every disciple is, God's

going to call in different

ways but he's calling you

now.

Just respond to him.

And again, maybe just

open up your hands as a

sign of surrender to him.

Jesus, fill us.

Show us yourself.

Let us want to be like you.

More than that, let us want

you.

Make us those who see the

whole, the beautiful calling

to be your disciple.

To see how precious you are

and to follow you today.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.