The Cost of Discipleship

Luke 14:25-35 – “Now great crowds accompanied Him [Jesus], and He turned and said to them, ‘If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.  Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.  For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?  Otherwise, when he has laid a  foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, “This man began to build and was not able to finish.”  Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand?  And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace.  So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.  Salt is good, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored?  it is of no use either for the soil or for the manure pile.  It is thrown away.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear.'”  

Take a piece of paper right now and write down the three most precious things in your life.  They do not need to be in a specific order.  They do not need to be material objects although they can be.  They just have to be the three things you treasure the most in this life.  The three things that if you could only possess three things it would be those things.  If you were Gollum from Lord of the Rings, you might write down “The One Ring to Rule Them All.”  If you were Sherlock Holmes, you might write down your best friend Watson.  If you were in love, you might write the person you are in love with.  If you were Lebron James, you might write down your only NBA championship ring.  Now, that you have written down your list, which one of these items would you be willing to give up?  Could you give up any of them?  Would you be willing to give this up for Jesus Christ, even if you got nothing else in return?  Consider these questions as you read the rest of this devotional.  Today, I am asking you to count the cost of discipleship.  Today, I am asking you to reconsider and redecide whether you truly want to be a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Throughout the Bible, God has made clear that He is not willing to share His position of first place in the hearts of His followers.  In Exodus 20:5, He states, “You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God…”  In Isaiah 42:8, He states, “I am the LORD; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.”  In Deuteronomy 6:13-15, it states, “It is the LORD your God you shall fear.  Him you shall serve and by His name you shall swear.  You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you — for the LORD your God in your midst is a jealous God — lest the anger of the LORD your God be kindled against you, and He destroy you from off the face of the earth.”  These are only a few of the verses that speak directly to this issue.  We also see it implied throughout other passages in the Word, such as, in Genesis, where God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac to test whether Abraham’s devotion was fully given to God or to his son.  Our God did not change from the Old Testament to the New Testament, and we see this same demand given to the disiciples of Jesus Christ here in our passage today in Luke 14:25-35 – “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own ilfe, he cannot be my disciple.”

A disciple of Jesus Christ is a person who is not only a student of the principles that Christ taught but an adherent, meaning a follower, a person who will stick to and allow the Lord to be King over his life.  Just as with anything else in life, Jesus Christ asked the large crowd following Him at the moment to count the cost.  He reminded them that if they were building a house, before they would even start laying the foundation of the house, they would count how much it cost lest they leave the project unfinished.  He reminded them that if they were going to war against another that they would consider if they could win in the first place, because if they could not, they would surrender.  So why would they not consider the cost of following Him?  They needed to count the cost,  “Everything.  If you are to follow Me, it will cost you everything.”

I am currently at a stage in my life where I am considering what I want to do with the rest of my life.  Yes, it is true that I probably should have made that decision quite a whiles ago, but I am seriously contemplating the issue now.  As I think about this question, I look into every career option counting the costs and benefits of each career.  If I were to get at PhD in a biological science alone, I would have to spend almost six years of my life performing research with a minimal stipend for living.  Then, I would spend the next six years after obtaining the PhD with a “limbo” position called a post-doc, where I would be working under someone for a barely liveable salary.  Finally, I would be able to have a professor position at a university, where I would struggle year after year to obtain grant money to continue research and pay my salary.  But throughout all of this, I might discover something that will put me in the history books, like Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine or Edward Jenner’s smallpox vaccine.  The benefit does not seem to outweigh the cost.  If I were to get a MD degree and become a doctor, I would possibly end up making a huge income after eight years of schooling, but I  would come out of school with piles of debt that extend for miles high.  It definitely has a huge cost, but the benefit might be just as great.  I am currently doing this with every single career option that I am considering – something that I am certain that most of you have also done with big decisions in your life.  The funny thing is that most of us have not counted the cost for discipleship.  We have taken the choice to follow Christ lightly and have not considered the cost, making our witness and testimony in reality fairly weak.  He asked for everything, are you willing to give it all for Him?  From this point forward, we will do three things:  1)  We will consider the cost of following Christ, 2)  We will consider the benefit of following Christ, and 3)  We will decide whether we will follow Christ or not.

The first thing that we will consider is the cost of following Christ, which has already been stated over and over – Everything.  Can you give up everything for Christ?  Can you take all three things on that list and lay them on the sacrificial altar to and for Him?  The reason I bring this question up to you today is because this is the same exact question that the Lord has been asking me lately – “Are you willing to give this up for me?”  For my list of three things, I would write my faith, my parents, and the rest of my family.  When I think about my faith, I know that the Lord does not necessarily need to ask me to give that up, because my faith is in Him.  But am I willing to give up my traditions and ideas of what the Christian faith should be like and follow His commands and His rules though it may not be according to what I originalyl thought?  Yes, I believe I am willing to.  When I think about the rest of my family, I feel like if He told me to leave them all and go and serve Him, I might be able to do that, since I already pulled off a year away on the other side of the country.  But when  it comes to my parents, I have to pause and reconsider the cost.

Just three days ago, I experienced one of the most horrific experiences in my life.  I can easily say that I have never had a more difficult experience than that.  Thursday night, around midnight, my dad and I had just finished watching Hoosiers on television.  He had stepped up and went to the bathroom before heading to bed, while I waited for the end credits to roll up on the screen.  Suddenly, I heard a huge thump coming from the bathroom.  I figured that my dad had dropped something so I headed over there to see if he needed help picking something up, when my eyes saw the one thing I feared the most in life.  I saw my dad on the floor not responding and unconscious.  I had never understood before that time what it was like to have one’s heart stop and one’s breath taken away but I understood right then and there.  As I failed to wake him for the next five-ten minutes, I had thought I had lost my father.  I cannot describe the feelings and thoughts that were rushing through my mind at that moment.  The only thought that really stuck was “Please Lord, You can’t have him.  I’m not ready to lose him yet.”  Thankfully, he regained consciousness and is now healing from the ordeal, but this incident has given me the opportunity to reconsider the cost of discipleship.  Was I willing to give up my dad to God’s will?  Would I be willing to give up my mom to God’s will?  Could I hate my father, my mother, my future wife and children, and even my life for Christ?  At that moment, the answer was clear – “NO!  No, I could not.”  Then, I could not be His disciple, for the cost is everything.  I could not like Keith Green said, “Pledge my life to heaven for the Gospel.”  I could not pay the cost.

I thought about this again tonight as I lay by my father’s side, “Am I willing to give him up for Christ?”  The truth is the decision came long and hard, but my answer finally came to a Yes, but not because I was ready to give him up, not because I felt like I could, but because I knew that when the time came, Christ would make me ready to handle the loss, all I had to be was willing to allow Him to have it.  Take a look at your list of three items.  Can you seriously give these up for Jesus Christ?  He asks that you hate all of these things in comparison to your love for Him.  Can you love Him that much?  Can you pay the cost?  You might not be ready to but are you willing to?

Now, like in every decision, you do not only count the cost, you must weigh the benefits, for sometimes, when the cost is high, it may be all worth it for the benefit that you will gain.  What do you get for giving up everything to the LORD?  The answer is just as short as the answer for the cost – “Christ.”  This is who you get for your giving up everything.  You get Jesus Christ.  Surprised?  I know.  So many people today teach that if you follow Jesus Christ, you will receive tons of blessings in this life.  There is this idea that is going around that “If you are good, your life will be good in an earthly sense.”  Look how Christ follows up in vs. 27, after telling the people that they needed to give up everything for Him, He tells them what they have to pick up – their own cross.  That does not sound anything like the prosperity preaching we hear today.  In exchange for the heavy cost of everything, you get a cross and the opportunity to follow Christ.  Is that worth it to you?  Are you willing to give up everything to have Jesus Christ and Him alone.  Yes, of course, Christ promises that you will have a home in heave, so you will be getting that.  Yes, of course, Christ promised that you get to partake in His glory.  But these are all just added things and to tell you the truth, these are given to everyone who chooses to make Christ Savior and Lord.  You do not need to be a disciple to have these things, you just need to be saved.  If you are to become a disciple what you are guaranteed is Christ and Him alone.  I want you to take a moment and consider if God took all these benefits away – no eternal life, no home in heaven, no promise of any of that.  If all He was to give you was Himself and freedom from sin and guaranteed persecution and difficulty, would you still give it all up for Him?  This is what He demands of each and every one of us.  Is Christ enough for you?  He is the benefit of discipleship.  (In Mark 10:29-30, Jesus also states that the person who gives everything up for His sake and the Gospels will receive a hundredfold in return, as well as, eternal life, but that will also come with persecution.)

Now knowing the cost of discipleship (EVERYTHING) and the benefit of discipleship (CHRIST), you can make an informed decision as to whether you still want to be His disciple.  In vs. 33, Christ states, “So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.”  He is asking you today at this exact moment, what is your decision?  Will you give up everything to have Him?  I have been careful not to write “just Him” because you are not getting something small and insignificant, you are receiving the Lord of the Universe as your own personal Lord.  You are having the Ruler of the Universe as your own personal Guide.  You are receving the Prince of Peace as the Peacemaker of your heart.  You are receiving a great benefit, though the cost may be very high.  Christ asked the great crowds that followed Him that day, whether they were willing to pay the cost, and He is asking you today the same question.  Are you willing to pay that cost?  If not, you calling yourself a Christian is as good as salt that no longer has the salty taste – useless and only for throwing into a pile of manure.  But if you are willing to, then you can become a great disciple of Christ. Make the choice today.  You never know when your life will be over.  My dad’s accident happened suddenly and who knows how long your life will be?  You can finish reading this blog and just stop dead in your tracks right after.  You must make the decision today.  You must listen to today.  Can you give it all up for Him or not?  This is the Cost – Everything.  This is the Benefit – Christ.  This is the choice – Discipleship.