Renouncing All That We Have

“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.” (Luke 14:27-33 ESV)

There are some people today who are teaching discipleship as optional. They are teaching that we can believe in Jesus, have all our sins forgiven, be on our way to heaven, but regardless of how we live. And they call that God’s grace. But God’s grace, which is bringing us salvation, trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions (lusts) and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives while we wait for our Lord’s return. God’s grace frees us from our slavery (addiction) to sin and it empowers us to live holy lives, pleasing to God (Titus 2:11-14; Romans 6:1-23; Luke 9:23-26; Matthew 7:21-23).

For to be true followers (disciples) of Christ it means that we must die with Christ to sin and be raised with Christ to walk in newness of life in him, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness, no longer as slaves to sin but now as slaves to God and to his righteousness. It means that sin is no longer what we practice, but righteousness and obedience to our Lord are what we practice, in the power and working of God’s Spirit now living within us. For if sin is what we practice, and not obedience to our Lord, it will lead to death, not to life eternal with God (Romans 6:1-23).

So being in relationship with Jesus Christ is not all about what he does for us but what we do in love response to him for what he did for us, as empowered by God’s Spirit living within us, and not of our own flesh. For it means that we die to the old us and we no longer get to do just whatever we want. Our lives now belong to God, and he is the one who gets to decide where we live and what we do and how we behave and the words that we speak. All that we are and have all belongs to the Lord and not to us. For our lives are now surrendered to him to do his will, not what our flesh desires.

So, before we respond to God drawing us to faith in Jesus Christ and we make that decision to believe in Jesus with God-persuaded and God-gifted faith in Jesus Christ, we need to know and to understand that this is about surrendering our lives to Jesus Christ to now be his possession to live our lives for him for his glory and purposes and no longer for ourselves. He now owns us. And we are now to serve him with our lives for the rest of our days. All that we have now belongs to him and is under his control and he is the one who decides what we have and don’t have.

And he is most likely going to call us to do things that will get us rejected and hated and cast off by others, for Jesus told us that if we follow him with our lives that this will happen to us. How they treated him, they will also treat us. And who are the “they” who mistreated Jesus? They were his own relatives, his family members, his fellow Jews, professers of faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and leaders and rulers in the temple or in the synagogues. They were religious zealots who professed one thing outwardly but lived the opposite in reality. Most of them were hypocrites.

Therefore, our enemies will be the same. They will be our family members, the members of our own households, and they will be fellow professers of faith in Jesus Christ, and they will be pastors and elders of church congregations (or of what is falsely being called “church”). And they will be hypocrites who profess one thing with their lips but who live the opposite of what they profess. So they will be liars and deceivers and manipulators and the self-indulgent who want to live for the flesh and not for God, and so if our lives are sold out to Jesus Christ, we will be an offense to them.

But if we should choose to bypass all of that, because it doesn’t sound too appealing to us, then we must know what the Scriptures teach on that subject. Jesus said that if anyone would come after him that he must deny self, take up his cross daily (die daily to sin and to self) and follow (obey) him. For if we hold on to our old lives of living in sin and for self, we will lose them for eternity. But if for the sake of Jesus we die with Christ to sin and we now live to him and to his righteousness, then we have eternal life in him (Luke 9:23-26).

[Matt 7:21-23; Lu 9:23-26; Jn 6:35-58; Jn 15:1-11; Rom 1:18-32; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-14; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; Gal 5:16-21; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 2:8-10; Eph 4:17-24; Eph 5:3-6; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:1-11; Titus 2:11-14; 1 Jn 1:5-10; 1 Jn 2:3-6; 1 Jn 3:4-10; Heb 10:23-31; 1 Co 10:1-22; Heb 3:1-19; Heb 4:1-13; Rev 21:8,27; Rev 22:14-15]

Oh, to Be Like Thee, Blessed Redeemer 

Lyrics by Thomas O. Chisholm, 1897

Music by W. J. Kirkpatrick, 1897

Oh, to be like Thee! blessèd Redeemer,

This is my constant longing and prayer;

Gladly I’ll forfeit all of earth’s treasures,

Jesus, Thy perfect likeness to wear.

Oh, to be like Thee! full of compassion,

Loving, forgiving, tender and kind,

Helping the helpless, cheering the fainting,

Seeking the wandering sinner to find.

O to be like Thee! lowly in spirit,

Holy and harmless, patient and brave;

Meekly enduring cruel reproaches,

Willing to suffer others to save.

O to be like Thee! while I am pleading,

Pour out Thy Spirit, fill with Thy love;

Make me a temple meet for Thy dwelling,

Fit me for life and Heaven above.

Oh, to be like Thee! Oh, to be like Thee,

Blessèd Redeemer, pure as Thou art;

Come in Thy sweetness, come in Thy fullness;

Stamp Thine own image deep on my heart.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrYhiK2nQBg 

Caution: This link may contain ads