Disciple
Disciples • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 3 viewsGod wants us to surrender our will and our ways that we may become like His Son, Jesus Christ
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To Follow....
To Follow....
If I say I “Follow” something or someone, in today’s pop culture what am I most likely saying? Again in today’s pop culture it usually means that I have liked, subscribed, sub’ed someone or something in social media. I am “following” their feed, I want their content to be what I see when I open an app, rather or not it is FB, IG, YT, TT, whatever… I am a follower of that thing… or that person...
38 And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
Tonight what I want you to see and understand is this… “To Follow” Jesus is a significantly deeper decision than simply hitting the sub button on social media app. “To Follow” Jesus means that we call Him master and we are His apprentice, a person legally bound to a master craftsman in order to learn a trade, As a follower, its not enough for us to just see His content, we have a command from God himself to surrender our will and our ways to his that we may become like Jesus Christ.
Background
Background
Open up your Bibles to Matthew Chapter 10 -
Tonight we are going to look at a passage from the Gospel of Matthew, Matthew is the first book of the New Testament it is one of the four books of the Bible we call the Gospels and they tell the story of Jesus’ time here on earth as a man, in this passage we see the Master, Jesus, giving instruction to his 12 apprentices or who we more commonly call His disciples. In this passage or story we get some insight into how Jesus leads a disciple and what a disciple can expect when living as one of his followers.
#1 Jesus leads with clear direction.
5 These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, 6 but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
Jesus told them where not to go and where to go. In this case we see that the message of the Gospel is to be brought to the Jewish people first, they were to speak to the spiritually sick of Israel. It didn’t mean they couldn’t teach others they met along the way who were a Gentile or Samaritan it just means they were not at this time the primary objective.
Matthew
#2. Jesus leads with clear directives.
7 And proclaim as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ 8 Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay.
They were to proclaim the “the kingdom of heaven is at hand”, this is a strange statement, what Jesus is saying in a very nice way is the “the kingdom of God is at hand”, he is saying that the message is this, get right with the man because judgement day is coming very soon.
We also see here that Jesus passed on to the disciples great power, the power over sickness, over death, over disease and over demons and not only did he give great power but also that just as he had given this power freely they were to use it freely! He didn’t want them to become greedy and chasing after fortune and fame!
#3. Jesus leads with clear instructions.
9 Acquire no gold or silver or copper for your belts, 10 no bag for your journey, or two tunics or sandals or a staff, for the laborer deserves his food. 11 And whatever town or village you enter, find out who is worthy in it and stay there until you depart. 12 As you enter the house, greet it. 13 And if the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it, but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. 14 And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town. 15 Truly, I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town.
Matthew 10
We see in this section exactly how the disciples are to prepare for the journey, where they are to stay and how they are to treat those that they meet alone the way
Difficulties
17 Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues,
Matthew 10:
18 and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles.
Matthew 10:
21 Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death,
Matthew 10:21
Jesus says, We must take up our cross and follow me,
what is the cross?
This is confusing, Jesus is over a year away from being crucified, why would he say such a thing?
Jesus was saying this....
to follow me is to die to self!
This is radically different than what the world says, we live in a culture is about getting followers! our sinful natures has us focusing on what is best for us, live how we want to live!
But God says we have a to have a kingdom shift in our thinking, but instead of simply tellinig us we are doing it all wrong Jesus does something so amazing....
He says to follow him and then he demonstrates what that looks like, an obiedient life lived until death itself no matter what the cost… .and boy there is a cost.
25 Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, 26 “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. 27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.
Luke 14:25-
Luke 14:28-
Well in today’s language it is somewhat different than in the past.
28 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? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’
31 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? 32 And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33 So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.
luke 14:31
So what does this all mean… we started with jesus sending out his disciples… and now we will close out with the command Jesus has for us,
18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:
7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Acts
So I ask tongight, looking at you life today and comparing with the teaching of tonight, how does this change your commitment to God. Are you willing tonight to give it all up, your desires, your dreams, your ideas of what success is.... To Follow? To be the apprentince to the master? Do you want to be a diciple of Christ?
6 whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.
is that you?
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