The Christian Handbook - Discipleship - Who We Follow Matters

All right, So we have been in a series titled the Christian Handbook Fundamentals

of the Faith. Do you remember why we're going through this series? Anyone?

Anyone? Do you know why we're going through the series. We want

to know, well, Christians believe at a fundamental level, what makes us

Christians? And how does what we believe cause us to live differently, to

walk out our walk differently, because our beliefs influence our actions. So and

this has kind of been more of a topical series. Normally, we're going

through books of the Bible more regularly, and were excited that once this one

comes to an end, we'll get to jump into another book of the Bible

and that will be really really awesome, just kind of grinding through verse by

verse, and we're super excited for that. But here we're still going through

the Bible. We have not stopped. We are looking at kind of almost

a big survey of a bunch of different topics within scripture that are fundamental beliefs

that this is what makes you a Christian in your belief and in your practice,

in your understanding of who God is and who we are. So we've

been trying to unravel that look to scripture to see what God has revealed to

us about who He is and who we are in light of that. So

we've looked at who God is, We've looked at what that means. We've

looked at his creation, all that he created that's included mankind, marriage,

the family. This was followed by the rebellion or the fall of mankind in

the garden, which broke everything, which causes the reason we see sin and

problems in this world. And if any of those somewhat interests you, or

you just want to or maybe you just started coming to the roots and you

want to feel like you're able to catch up and kind of know where we're

at. All of those are online on our YouTube page, and so you

can just go back, you can catch up. It's a good time.

So the last several weeks we have been looking at the gospel. We've been

looking at what Christ accomplished in light of our rebellion and our need for a

savior from our sin and from our dead works looking to a perfect savior who

lived a perfect life, died the death that we could not die, and

raise the life, and that is our hope. We've been looking at this

gospel which means good news. And now we're going to make a shift in

the series. So we've been looking at almost this kind of header of the

Gospel and all the things that are super important for us to know as believers

that are right underneath that. Now today we're going to make a shift.

Last night or last Sunday, we kind of finished up talking about how that

good news impacts us personally. It was much more on a personal level in

regards to looking at the daily struggle as Christians individually, what that war that

we feel inside and the difference that we feel inside. Once once we're dwelled

with the spirit, now now we have conflicting desires, and that is something

that is okay because sometimes we're like, man, I mess up, and

don't I feel bad that I mess up? But I knew that I chose

to mess up, and it's kind of confusing. But that is our life

day in and day out as believers as we grow more and more into the

image of Jesus. So now we're going to move from that gospel and how

it impacts us personally to more of the collective individuals who have been saved,

which is going to bring us to our next big umbrella in our series that

is going to finish us out. This header is going to kind of finish

us out for the rest of our series, which is that is looking at

the topic of the church, the church. What is the church? It

is all of those who have put their faith in Jesus and have been saved

by His grace. It is the body of Christ with its many members all

making up one body. All right, So all of us were saved individually,

but together we all make up the body of Christ. There's a couple

of reasons that this is important to know. Is because the church is not

a building. This around us, if we look around, the lights,

even the microphones, the chairs, that is not church. This is a

building that helps us facilitate church. Does that make sense? Yeah, tracking

the church is not a building that we meet at. So what is the

church? The church is the gathering of believers. The church is not wherever

the sign is at, but wherever believers are at. Does that make sense?

Not wherever the signs at, the building any of that. People People

identify that that's church, but only because that's where Christians meet, that's where

Christians go. But that itself is not the church. The collection, the

gathering of the believers is church. So for the next couple of weeks,

we're going to be looking at, well, what does that look like when

we gather? What does that mean? What do we do? Why do

we do that? And not this? What are we supposed to do?

What's the bare minimum? Does it matter what it looks like when we gather?

These are all gonna be things that we're going to be covering going over

through. But I think there's a couple of things to know before we jump

into our specific topic for today, and that is that the church belongs to

Jesus. The church belongs to Jesus, which means that we belong to Jesus

as that gathering of believers. Let's look at Matthew sixteen eighteen. Jesus is

talking to Peter and he says, and I tell you that you are Peter,

and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of

Hades will not overcome it. Who does it say, will build Jesus's church

Jesus. Now a lot of people think it's kind of it's Peter, but

that's actually not what he's talking about. If you look at the fuller context,

Peter has just professed Christ's Lord. Peter has just recognized that Christ is

Lord, that Jesus is the Messiah. And Jesus is saying, on this,

on that proclamation, on that statement, on that profession, I will

build my church. But how how practically does Jesus build his church? Well,

funny enough, one of the ways that he does that is through his

church. It kind of goes hand in hand. Let's look at Matthew eighteen

through twenty, also known as the Great Commission. Jesus is the name,

discipling is the game. Then Jesus came to them and said, all authority

in heaven and on earth has been given to who me, That's Jesus.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of

the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, in teaching them

to obey everything I have commanded you, and surely I am with you always

to the very end of the age. So here Jesus gives what is referred

to as the Great Commission. He says, go, and not does he

just not only does he just say go, but he says, I have

all authority in heaven, on earth, and on earth. He has all

of it. There's no other name that is higher than his, the other,

no other authority by which we look to to figure out what we're supposed

to do. And he tells his disciples to go and go and do?

What what doas he to tell him to go do? He tells him to

go make disciples. He tells him to go make disciples, which means that

today we are going to be looking at our primary topic for today under church,

which is discipleship. Let's go back to the Great Commission textually quick starting

verse eighteen as Jesus can we go back to the top of Matthew twenty eight

eighteen YEP. Then Jesus came to them and said, all authority in heaven

on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all

nations, baptizing them and teaching them. Baptizing them and teaching them. So

Jesus sends his disciples, his church into the world to make disciples, which

kind of consists of two pieces. First one is people getting saved through the

proclamation of the Gospel, which is the good news of what Jesus Christ has

done. And that is what that baptism is right, because what happens when

you believe. What's the first thing you do when you put your faith in

Jesus, Well, I gotta get baptized. It's time to get baptized.

And why do we get baptized. It's a share to the world that I

am now a believer. I identify with Him, I identify with Christ.

I have been buried with Him, and I know and have the hope within

me that I will be raised with Him. And then the second piece of

that is after that, which is an amazing time. And we get to

do baptisms and celebrate when we do baptisms because we have another person come into

the body, come into the fold, who was lost and is now found,

and we celebrate. But then then what then? What we don't get

baptized every day? We continue to trust Christ every single day, for sure,

we believe the gospel every day and trust in the Gospel. But then

what, Well, now it comes the part where we live out this new

life in Christ, submitted to him as our Lord in the way that in

Jesus didn't leave us in the dark, which is amazing. He's a good

Lord. He's a he's a good he's a good teacher. He's not just

a good teacher, but he has not left us, which is going like,

all right, I'm saved now, I'm just gonna figure this thing out.

But he has said to his disciples to help teach other disciples to obey

everything Jesus had commanded him, which is one of the primary functions of the

church. That's what we do here every single Sunday. Every single Sunday,

we show up here, someone opens a book that is God's Word and expo

shares what is within it. Because sometimes sometimes it's nice because this is the

most Bible reading we get done in a week, which is also unfortunate.

But hopefully this fuels us to see that we can open our Bibles and we

can understand it that sometimes it's actually a lot clearer than we might think.

But it's the problems. We just keep starting to Matthew and get into the

genealogy and go like that was enough for today, right, and then we

don't want to pick it up again. Go to chapter two. Keep reading,

keep reading, keep reading, and we will see that it can it

will start to transform us, especially if our our appetite or our diet isn't

just eating once a week. So we show up here on Sunday, we

open God's Word together, we read it together, and we long to understand

what God has said so that we can live that out and we can understand

him better because that will impact us. When we know him better, we

will know ourselves better. So today I want to take a close up look

at Jesus's life which included disciple making and the example that he set forth for

disciple making and the commands of what a disciple looks like it and all of

those things. We're going to try and cover that, so what it means

and how to do it, and we're going to do that by going through

three major points. So the first one is the call. Okay, so

the first point is the call. That is the call to discipleship. Get

Matthew four eighteen through twenty two. As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of

Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew.

They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. Come

follow me, Jesus said, and I will send you out to fish for

people. At once, they left their nets and followed him. Going on

from there, he saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebede

and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father, Zebedee,

preparing their nets. Jesus called them and immediately they left the boat and

their father and followed him. We're talking about discipleship. This first aspect is

the call to discipleship. See Jesus call these men to come follow him.

Now, this concept of discipleship, depending whether or not you were brought up

in the church, and even if you did or were brought up in the

church, might be a foreign idea to a lot of us. This idea

of discipleship. What does that mean? What does that look like? This?

This isn't a word that we typically find out in the world. This

is something that you might hear just in passing at church. And the meaning

of the word disciple is that of a learner, a pupil, or an

apprentice. Does that make sense? A learner, a pupil, or an

apprentice, which usually implies what that there's a teacher, that there's someone helping

that person along in their walk. Now, some of us may say,

I know that I'm a Christian, but I'm not sure that I would call

myself a disciple. But I want us to look at a quick place in

Scripture Acts eleven twenty six. And when he found him, he brought him

to Antioch. So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church

and taught a great and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called

Christians first to Antioch. So who were disciples? Christians? We just got

a cool nickname. I don't know if it was cool then, but now

now we wear it. You know, we call ourselves Christians. We call

ourselves believers. We say that we're Christians. So that means if you are

a Christian, if you call yourself a Christian, you're a disciple. It

was the Disciples who were called Christians. So what are Christians? Christians are

Disciples. They're the same thing, back and forth, same thing. Christians.

Christ is literally in the name. The reason I'm making this point is

because I need us all to realize that for every believer, Jesus has called

you and me to follow him. That makes sense. Sometimes we get saved,

right, we think that's it. And if we don't start picking up

our Bible early on in our Christian walk, we might miss out on Jesus's

call to those who would follow him, kind of like sometimes we maybe we

think that we get saved, and then we're basically like waiting outside school for

Jesus to come pick us up. There's nothing else for us to do.

We're just kind of waiting for our bag. We're not supposed to be in

charge of anything. We're not supposed to be working on anything, growing in

any capacity. He's on his way to show up and pick us up.

I just need to wait. He is on his way, but he hasn't

just left us to twiddle our thumbs and wait around. There's more to it

that goes on. Let's look at Matthew for eighteen through twenty again. As

Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon

called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake,

for they were fishermen, right, so they're just they're doing their normal

work. Jesus comes along and says, come follow me, Come follow me,

and he goes on to say, and I will send you out to

fish for people. Or your translation, which is my preference of the translation.

He says, follow me, I will send you or in your translation

it might say, I will make you fishers of men. So what is

the goal of the students to learn? It's to grow. And there's a

real reason that all of this is really relevant. All of this matters.

Why we're talking about this today, and that's because everybody is a disciple.

I just said Christians or disciples totally, but everyone's a disciple. Everyone is

a disciple or following something. Okay, every everyone's a disciple. Everyone's learning,

growing, following, chasing something. And this can be good or it

can be bad, which lead us leads us to our our message title for

today. Right, we just got to the message chattel. Oh, don't

worry, it's it's it's just deeper into the message. Okay, it's okay,

take a deep breath. We're trucking along. Don't worry, we're making

good time. But let's look at it. Discipleship. Who you follow matters?

Discipleship? Why is it important? Because who you follow matters? Everyone

is following someone, Everyone is following something. So what are you following?

What are you following? We have you know, because this isn't something that

we get to be passive in. Let's look at another verse. Luke sixty

the student is not above the teacher, but everyone who's fully trained will be

like their teacher. That's a great verse. Do you know what the problem

is? Always I always forget where the context of this verse is. I

always think it's in literally Jesus probably telling this sup. It's like, hey,

yeah, you guys are You're gonna be trained up and you're gonna end

up looking just like me. But I had to double check that context and

it changed everything. Luke six thirty nine. The verse right before it,

this is what Jesus says. He also told them this parable. Can the

blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a pit? The

student is not above the teacher, but everyone who's fully trained will be like

their teacher. Do you see where the problem is? Is that if your

teacher is a blind man, if you're a teacher is a false teacher,

if your teacher is going to have you chased after something else, you two

are going to fall into the pit. Because everyone who has trained and brought

up to look like who they're following, they're going to have the same end.

So this is a warning, and it's why who we are following matters,

because there's a lot of things that are gonna be calling our name.

We kind of looked at that and touched on that a little bit last week.

But there's a lot of things pulling for our attention and our fleshly desires,

a lot of things calling our name. But what we need to do

is be intentional with which one we're responding to, because we're gonna have a

lot of different calls. We're have a lot of different things calling our names,

calling our interests, attention, literally setting the course and focus of our

life. So we need to be intentional with what we're following. So when

we hear Jesus's call, we need to respond to it. He's Jesus.

When he calls his disciples, he says what he says, follow me.

So are we What what relation does this have to do with the church.

What does this have to do with the church? Can't I follow Jesus on

my own? Well, I would say that if you are alone in antarctica

and you've lost self service, you have no access to the internet, and

it's just you, then sure, sure, But the real answers no,

The answers no. Discipleship is not done alone. We follow Jesus together.

Jesus didn't have one disciple, He had many who were together constantly. What

wasn't always pretty either, which is why I was good that they were all

following Jesus, just as we saw in the Great Commission. One of the

things that disciples do is to help other disciples follow Jesus. Does that make

sense? One of the things that disciples do is help others disciples follow Jesus,

meaning disciples make disciples. We need to be disciples ourselves, and we

need to be discipling. We need someone in our life who is helping us

to personally follow Jesus. Also, we have the great opportunity to also be

someone who helps someone personally walk out their walk with Jesus. Paul says and

First Corinthians. He says, it's wonderful follow my example. As I follow

the example of Christ, how many of us would have to stop here follow

my example. That might be a big reason that we don't do discipleship because

it's close. You end up having to kind of see my laundry and challenge

me or correct me. But then you also don't have someone to encourage you

and love and care for you and show you what it actually looks like to

follow Jesus. And we've already seen the goal in discipleship is to better follow

Jesus. So the people that we're learning from, the people who are discipling

us, they themselves need to be following Jesus. That's kind of the problem

with our modern world that we live in is that we can go on the

internet and we can find someone that we maybe that sounds like they're following Jesus,

but we'll never see them drive on the drive in, We'll never see

them in a tight situation or in a frustrating situation. We don't get that

opportunity to actually do life with these people. And in Hebrews three seven or

thirteen seven, there's this great verse that's one of my favorite verses, because

when we're looking for someone to disciples, when we're looking for someone to help

us, sometimes we'll just go We'll be so hopeless that there's some things that

we forget to consider. Let's look at it. Remember your leaders who spoke

the word of God to you. This should be a must. You see

these people opening their word, going through their word, knowing their word,

and then this, this is incredible. Consider the outcome of the way of

their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus talks all the time,

and we talked about it a little bit last week about the fruit that we're

bearing. Are we bearing bad fruit or good fruit? We should consider our

leaders can go what fruit are you bearing? Because when we see that food

and go like, I see the relationship you have with Jesus, I see

your knowledge of God's word and how that's impacted your your life and impacted your

family in all of these positive ways. We have the opportunity to go like,

what's what's going on here? How what have you done? Because it's

it's nothing magical, it's just someone following Jesus. And when someone actually starts

to follow Jesus, they're gonna start to bear good fruit. So are we

on the lookout for the good fruit? A lot of times we look for

the bad fruit, and then we use that as a justification to just stay

away from all trees. Right, we go like everyone, everyone's bearing bad

fruit everyone, and there's people actually bearing good fruit, but we use it

it's a justification for to disconnect and unplug and not follow the call. So

we need these kinds of people in our life, and we have to remember

it that they won't be perfect. But we need those who will first be

honest that they aren't perfect, and second that you can see the fruit in

their life of them following Jesus. Paul, when writing to his disciple Timothy,

says, second Timothy three ten through eleven, you, however, have

followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith,

my patience, my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and suffratings. I

want to stop here really quick. I'm going to reiterate what I said a

couple of minutes ago. I don't think I've did a very good job of

that. I think sometimes we don't get disciples because we go like that means

I have to clean up my act. It means I actually would have to

set an example for what it looks like to follow Jesus. That would hold

me accountable to something. It doesn't mean you have to put on, but

it does mean that it's gonna. It's gonna when you know eyes are looking

at you, people are looking to you in some kind of way, it

will start to help bring accountability to your life that honestly, you probably should

have been doing in the first place. So it's a good opportunity. But

like I said, you also, one of the first things you can say

is I don't know everything and I'm flawed, So don't put your trust in

hope in me. We're trying to follow Jesus better together. So he's going

down this list my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at

Iconium, and at Lystra. Which persecutions I endured? Yet from them all

the Lord, Yet from them all the Lord rescued me. So the ones

who should be discipling us are the ones who are walking the walk right.

Lots of people, they say, lots of stuff, so they don't ever

do anything. You don't actually see any fruit in their life come from them.

A Paul when he's writing to his disciple Timothy, is saying, you've

followed me, You've seen what I've done. You've been with me in that

thing, You've been with me in those afflictions, which is just honestly,

it's a good reminder that sometimes coffee isn't just down over coffee, right,

because we go like our usual picture of discipleship is let's get coffee and we'll

talk about Jesus. We'll talk about our life and those things are good,

and those things are positive. But personally I've seen I've been greatly blessed by

that the duncan you see today? God's grace first and then the people he

brought them to my life to disciple me every single week over coffee, bless

my life. But that's not where it stopped. That wasn't the only thing

that happened. They invited me into their life and said, come do what

I am doing. So the people who are discipling us, we shouldn't it

shouldn't just all be talked. But where is our opportunity to go, like,

how do I be a part? How do I be involved? And

we're gonna see people who are running, who are running to meet the needs

of they're gathering to meet the needs during week, during the week, and

us to have a better opportunity to going, Hey, where are you going?

And it's like, I don't get any time that you can follow me.

And then's just start trying to chase and follow and run with them.

It's going to start to mold you and shape you and even change your perspective

as not only you just get to talk with the people who do stuff,

but start to do things with the people who are putting their hands to the

work and making it happen, actually living out what it looks like to be

a disciple. The discipleship relationship is a real relationship between believers, typically as

we've seen of a more mature believer and a young believer. And that's why

we see Paul not just called Timothy his disciple, but we get we see

him also refer to Timothy as his son. Let's look at first Timothy one.

Two, to Timothy my true son in the faith, Grace, mercy

and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. He calls Timothy

his true son in the faith. There's real relationship, and so a couple

of things that they need to be said here at first, when it comes

to our actual children, whose responsibility is it to disciple them? It's ours.

It's ours as parents. It is our responsibility. That is the responsibility

that God has given us in raising our children. Can we get help,

most definitely that's going to look different across the board, but that doesn't mean

we get to buck. The responsibility is when we stand before God, He's

going to say I gave you this responsibility. We won't be able to say,

but the teacher in the Sunday school whatever, we won't have, our

mouths will be stopped. It's our responsibility to disciple our children. A second,

a lot of us come from different backgrounds, so we might have either

not had the best parents. We may have not had Christian parents, which

at times we might feel like at a loss. Right, we didn't get

to watch veggiels growing up, so everyone's talking about vegetails and I don't know

what we're talking about. I don't know the songs yet. Right, that's

the hope yet, But sometimes we can feel like we missed out. We

missed out on that wisdom it was. It wasn't that they were perfect people,

but maybe we feel like we missed out on what that could have how

that would have shaped us and give us a better leg up on this walk.

But God, through his Church has given us many spiritual fathers and mothers,

people who, though they may not be our own flesh and blood,

have been redeemed by the same blood and adopted into the same family of God.

And God uses them, He uses us to help raise up other believers.

We see a kind of a cool example of this and these We're to

look again at these endearment terms. Right, So this discipleship relationship isn't just

a cold I'm doing this, you follow me, But there's a relationship aspects

here. Look, let's look at first John two one through six. My

dear children, My dear children, I write this to you so that you

will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with

the Father, Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice

for our sins, and not only for ours, but also for the sins

of the whole world. We know that we have come to know him if

we keep his commandments. Whoever says I know him but does not do what

he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person.

But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in

them. This is how we know we are in him. Whoever claims to

live in him must live as Jesus did. That was a lot. First

thing I wanted us to see is that he calls him my dear children,

and then he goes on to give him kind of this list. I write

this to you so that you do not sin, But if you do sin.

There is a mediator, and then there's kind of a challenge, and

he's like, if you say that you're following Jesus and you're not walking,

you're not moving, nothing's happening, then you're lying. Who in your life

would talk to you like this? Do you have someone in your life who

would talk to you this? My dear children, they love you. They

just want to know that if you are sinning, there's encouragement and they're going

to give you a clear path forward. I write this to you so that

you do not sin. Do you have someone in your life who can talk

to you like that, who's going to encourage you when you need encouragement and

challenge you when you need to be challenged, and if you don't, you

don't need to be discouraged. That's why we gather, That's why we have

other believers. We need to know that we have this need so that we

can meet this need. And there are many people here who would love to

pour into you and are waiting for that opportunity. And I think that we

as believers a lot of times we want to put the responsibility on someone else.

Would be like, well, if someone has asked me to disciple and

might totally do it right. And there's other times where we're maybe not seeking

the opportunity? Are we seeking it? And that goes on both sides.

Are we going? Man, I'm seeing the needs of my life and this

is not working. I need someone to come alongside me. Find someone look

at the way of their life. Ask them if you're an older believer and

you know, like, all right, maybe you have someone in your life

who has discipled you and shown you how to walk and follow Jesus. Let's

let's spread that. Let's be able to share that you know how it's blessed

your life. So I think we need to be better at looking around and

going like is their need The answer will be yes, and seeing those opportunities

to step up into those spaces. So to rediterate the call, who we

follow matters. Let's move on to the next piece of discipleship. And Jesus

calls us to follow him. He's good. He lets us know what we're

in for, which is why we're gonna. We called the second piece the

cost. This is the cost of discipleship. Let's look at what Jesus has

to say in a couple of places. Luke nine as they were walking along

the road, a man said to him, I will follow you wherever you

go. Jesus replied, Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the

son of man has no place to lay his head. He said to another

man, follow me. But he replied, Lord, first let me go

and bury my father. Jesus said to him. Let the dead bury their

own dead, but you go and proclaim the Kingdom of God. Still another

said, I will follow you, Lord, but first let me go back

and say goodbye to my family. Jesus replied, no one who puts,

who puts a hand to the plow and looks back, is fit for service

in the Kingdom of God. Jesus is hard core, but it's nice because

he lays it out really clear for us right at the beginning, and really,

what we're seeing here, you might go like that's harsh, but there's

something he's getting at. We see here immediately that those who follow Jesus have

a radical rearrangement of their priorities. Jesus radically immediately challenges all of our priorities.

Look at another place, and it's just it gets more fun. Luke

fourteen. Large crowds are traveling with Jesus and turning to them, he said,

if anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother,

wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even their own life,

such a person cannot be my disciple. And whoever does not carry their cross

and follow me cannot be my disciple. Intense That's what Jesus said the first

time I was reading through the Gospel of Luke that I stopped here for a

while. I stopped here and had to go What is he saying? Suppose

one of you wants to build a tower, won't you first sit down and

estimate the cost to see if you have enough need to complete it. For

if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who

sees it will ridicule you, saying this person began to build and wasn't able

to finish. Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another

king, won't he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten

thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand. If he

is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a

long way off, and will ask for terms of peace in the same way.

Those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my

disciples. Jesus keeps it real. Jesus tells his disciples who are going to

follow him, count the costs, and what is the costs everything? The

cost is everything, and these are really intense versus. Jesus said, I

need to hate my family and even my own life. I thought we were

to love our neighbor as ourselves. I thought that's what we're supposed to do.

We do. What Jesus is getting at here is that if we're going

to follow Jesus, our priorities need to change. Who is first. The

cost of following Jesus is everything that is Jesus over everything. Does that make

sense? It's Jesus over everything. That is the cost. And this is

very good reason, because Jesus gives lots of warnings as well about those who

would sprout up and be choked out by what. Let's look at Matthew thirteen.

The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word,

but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of deceitfulness of wealth choke the

word, making it what unfruitful, the worries of life and seanfulness of wealth.

Jesus tells us disciples to consider the cost, because if we don't,

then we end up in a world of hurt. If we don't give these

things up, they will get in the way of us walking and following Jesus.

Do you know what makes discipleship hard? We do. We make discipleship

hard, usually because we don't want to give things up and submit to what

Jesus has for us. But the thing that we do need to know because

we can look at them and going like, oh my gosh, how I

don't know? Everything we follow is going to cost us something. Who we

follow matters because no matter who you're following, it is going to cost you

something. The question is what is it going to cost you? The problem

is that the world the devil are flesh or deceitful. We hear Jesus say

give up everything, and we start to grab everything tighter. We go,

ah, I don't know about that this? Are you sure about this?

You wanted this? The world will say you don't need to give that up.

Follow me and you can have a little or maybe even a lot,

But what will you end up with? Nothing. The world promises something and

never delivers. The world promises and then delivers nothing. But what does Jesus

promise? Let's look at him, Luke nine. Then he said to them,

whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross

daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it.

But whoever loses their life for me will save it. What good is

it for someone to gain the whole world and yet lose or forfeit their very

self. Whoever is a shamed of me and my words, the son of

Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in the glory and then the

glory of the Father and of the Holy angels. What we follow will cost

us. Jesus says, you want to hold onto your life, you're gonna

lose it. But if you will let go of it, you will gain

it. And this isn't something that we do reluctantly. We do it reluctantly.

That is our habit. We normally are reluctant to give up everything.

But Matthew thirteen forty four, he paints a great picture. The Kingdom of

Heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field when a man found it,

How would you feel if he found hidden treasure in the field? He hid

it again, and then in his joy, went and sold what all he

had and bought that field, because he knew everything he had was worth nothing

compared to this. The cost of following of Jesus is out aid by the

worth of knowing Jesus. And all of us who will follow Jesus for some

time know this. It's not an easy road, but it's always worth it

because Jesus is worth it. So we have the call and cost. Oh,

actually, let's look at Philippians three eighth through eleven really quick. What

is more? And this is Paul, I consider everything a loss because of

the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have

lost all things. I consider them garbage that I may gain Christ and be

found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the

law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness that comes

from God. On the basis of faith. I want to know Christ,

yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings,

because becoming like him in his death and so somehow attaining to the resurrection from

the dead. It's easy when we have a proper perspective. It will re

orient our priorities. So we've looked at the call and the cost of discipleship.

Let's look at the last thing. And I need the band to come

up please our last point. What does all this lead to? This call

and this cost of discipleship. It leads to the conforming of disciples Romans eight

twenty nine. For those God for new He also predestined to be what conformed

to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many

brothers and sisters. So conformed to whose image Jesus, If that's who we're

following, that is our goal as disciples to grow in our faith and become

conformed to His image. And this has to be an intentional thing for us

as believers. Why because in Romans it says Romans twelve two. Do not

conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of

your mind. You're either being conformed to the pattern of this world or to

Christ. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is,

His good, pleasing and perfect will like we talked about last week,

there is no middle ground. Man. We wish there is middle ground,

but there isn't. We're conforming, we're being taught, we're being discipled by

something. We're either going to be conformed to the pattern of this world or

to Christ. Colossians three nine through ten, do not lie to each other,

since you have taken off your old self with its practices, and have

put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge and the image

of its creator. This is why we do discipleship. This knowledge that God

has given us, this understanding in his word revealed to us who He is.

And we have these discipleship relationships so that we can build each other up,

to know each other better and help each other walk this life out.

The call and cost of discipleship is all to help us to conform to the

image of Jesus and look more like him. And Jesus says in John thirteen

a new commandment. I give you love one another as I have loved you,

So you must love one another. By this, everyone will know that

you are my disciples. If you love one another. Jesus sets the bar

at himself. We are to love like he did. That is how disciples

will be recognized because they will look like him. Everyone knows what sport team

you follow, what bandy listened to, because we like to wear their jackets,

they put on their stickers. So if someone were to look at you,

who would they see, what would they recognize? That's summarize the first

thing, which was the call who you follow matters? So the questions who

are you following? Who is helping you to follow Jesus? And who are

you helping? The way that we like to say this is who's discipling you?

And who are you discipling? The second thing, have you counted the

cost? Sometimes? That's really what gets in the way of our growth with

Jesus is because we keep going like, man, why do I keep getting

stuck? And it's because we haven't gone like, am I ready to die?

Am I prepared to die? To myself, to my old ways,

to my flesh? Because if you've had that talk with yourself, it makes

a little easier because then you can just go remember, remember we decided this,

we knew what it was going to cost us. And if you haven't,

I would pray to God to have your view of him magnified. Because

it makes it easier. So God, make me see the worth that you

have. Help me know you better so that you would be magnified, that

I would see the worth that outweighs the cost. And then this is just

kind of like a quick, easy thing. Is what have you been conforming

too lately? What's got your attention and what needs to change to help you

grow more into the image of Jesus. So would you guys please stand today

we looked at the high call of discipleship that none of us get to hide

from it or bucks the system. And genuinely I hope that this encourages you

and challenges us as a body of believers to see the need and meet the

need or ask for the need. Because today the goal isn't to beat us

up and be like we suck at this, that's not the point. It's

the point of dual. What has Jesus laid out for us? How do

we live out being His church? So if you're beating yourself up, stop,

you don't need to beat yourself up because we can remember that Jesus died

for our sins, failures and shortcomings. And if you put your faith in

Jesus, He's started to work in you to conform him to himself. And

we now have this opportunity to look around us and go like, who can

help me do this? Let's not beat ourselves up. We got to remember

that his grace is sufficient for each day and cling to him every single day,

and honestly, having someone else is going to help us do that.

We rely on Jesus and his spirit to help us do that. And so

we asked that the need would be seen and the need would be met,

that he would provide like he always does. So I'm gonna look at in

a second, I'm gonna look at read one more section of scripture and then

pray. But after that, what we're gonna do is we're gonna worship our

Lord and we're gonna have elders on the side ready to pray for you for

anything that you need. If you need, if you want to discipleship relationship,

come ask us and either maybe we would meet that need, or maybe

we can point you in the right direction to meet what you are looking for.

Because we want to help us. We all want to grow and look

more and more like Jesus. So let's read Filippians three seventeen through twenty one.

Join together and following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as

you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as

we do. For as I have often told you before and now tell you

again, even with tears, many live as enemies of the Cross of Christ.

Their destiny is destruction, Their God is their stomach, and their glory

is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things. But our

citizenship is in heaven, and we eagerly await a savior from there, the

Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything

under his control, will transform us, or transform our lowly bodies so that

they will be like his glorious body. Let's pray, Father God, we

need you, Lord Jesus. We cry out to you Holy Spirit, empower

us so that we would look and conform to look more and more like you

look. God, Please bring the opportunities into our lives that we would have

real relationship that would help us know who you are and grow to look more

and more like you, and not just to look like you, Lord God,

but to know you, so that our relationship, we'd have relationships that

help facilitate our relationship with You, God. We want to know what that

surpassing worth is regard. So we asked that you would bring people into our

lives to help us see that help us on our walk of following you,

or God, that we would be seen as a body, as a gathering

of believers who love You, and it would be obvious because we follow after

you, that we've been conforming and looking more and more like you, that

we have a genuine love for each other. God, we thank you that

we have these brothers and sisters here. And so we ask that you would

put us to work, help us to show us what we've been created for.

Give us those opportunities or God. And we asked that this wouldn't be

in the spirit of a law of doing the Lord God, and the freedom

of what you've called us to, of of loving one each other one another

and and serving one another in that freedom. Well, God, help us

not make our lives all about us, but all of You. We give

all these things to you in Jesus name. We pray. Everyone said Amen, Let's worship