Discipleship: Understanding Your Purpose

Are You a Disciple of Jesus? – Part 5: Your Purpose (Luke 14:34-35) REVIEW: Three Elements Are Required for True Discipleship: 1. Placing God’s Truth into My Head – LEARNING – Pedagogy 2. Putting God’s Truth into My Actions – LIVING – Practice 3. Prioritizing God’s Truth in My Choices – LEAVING – Priorities We must be learning, and living what we learn, and leaving our priorities for new priorities (Luke 14:25-35). Leaving Requires Changes to Three Key Areas of Priority: 1. God Precedes All PEOPLE (God Displaces All Relationships) If anyone comes to Me and DOES NOT hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. 26 2. God Defines All PURSUITS (God Replaces All Ambitions) And whoever DOES NOT bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. 27 3. God Controls All POSSESSIONS (God Governs All Belongings) So likewise, whoever of you DOES NOT forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple. 33 Jesus Gives Two Examples of Counting the Cost: Building & Fighting • Jesus shares these to illustrate the importance of counting the cost. • Jesus has counted the cost, and these 3 priorities reflect that cost. Avoid Common Errors People Make About These Parables 1. Error #1: Trying to Define All the Details 2. Error #2: Relating this Passage to Salvation 3. Error #3: Suggesting Discipleship Is Only for the Serious Find Biblically Consistent Clarity in These Parables 1. Works Can Never Save You 2. Discipleship Is Not Optional 3. Jesus, Not You, Counts the Cost Summary Thoughts on the Two Parables • Jesus is not offering the option of discipleship; He is defining it. • Jesus is describing the obedient Christian life; the only other life is a life of disobedience and rejection of His revealed will for your life. Northridge Baptist Church – Pastor Kevin Subra – June 28, 2020 Discipleship: Understanding Your Purpose "Salt is good; but if the salt has lost its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? 35 "It is neither fit for the land nor for the dunghill, but men throw it out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!" 34 Jesus Illustrates Our Sole Purpose Using Salt 1. The __________________________ Statement About Salt • Therefore – illustrating what He just said (NAU “Therefore, salt is good”) • Good the salt – common knowledge (lit. “excellent therefore the salt”) • The focus is on salt’s ability to season (not to preserve, etc.) 2. The __________________________ of Savorless Salt • If the salt becomes tasteless – loss of its ________________ purpose o saltiness, in this context, is the 3 priorities o becomes tasteless (foolish) – passive, happens from __________ - our priorities are shaped only by purposefully choosing - not choosing means our priorities are chosen for us o without the 3 priorities, we have missed our ________________ • How will it be seasoned? o There is no re-salting of salt. o Only salt does what salt does. o There is no backup option to 3-priority discipleship (outfielder). 3. The __________________________ Existence of Savorless Salt • Is…Fit (“useful it is being”) – The point is ______________________. • “Neither…” – Worse than worthless. It misses its primary purpose, has no other useful secondary purpose, and can even be harmful. o For the land – Not usable as soil (kills plants) o For the dunghill – Not usable as fertilizer (ruins land) • “Outside they are throwing it” – No value or use; hard to dispose of. 4. The Command to __________________ (& to __________________) • WHO: The ones having ears to be hearing • WHAT: Let them be hearing! Closing Thoughts: Discipleship leads to _________________ & produces _________________. Refusal to follow Jesus by adopting these priorities is disobedience, and misses God’s design for your life on earth, and results in being useless in matters of eternal impact during your lifetime. Will you be a disciple of Jesus?