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Luke 9:57-62 – The Cost of Following Jesus
My brothers and sisters in Christ,I flipped on the radio while I was working the other night. I waslistening to a radio talk show program that I normally listen to. Thehost was talking about Christianity and why people pursue our religious faith.
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The core of what he was saying was this: people enter the Christianfaith in order to fill some sort of need. He argued that some of the people coming into our churches do so because they need somesense of purpose. Other people come because they have been hurtspiritually or psychologically and they need healing. Still otherscome to our places of worship in order to be a part of our community.I don’t know why I keep listening to this show. I usually end upwanting to break something after about fifteen minutes. But youknow what – The other night he was right.The wonderful thing about the Christian faith and the church is thatit does fill all of these needs
and more besides. Not only do wereceive purpose, healing and fellowship but we also find grace…we find forgiveness…we find reconciliation with God and oneanother…we receive the gift of eternal life promised and deliveredin the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.He was right. We are a blessed people. We read the familiar wordsof Psalm 23: You prepare a table before me in the presence of myenemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surelygoodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I willdwell in the house of the Lord forever.
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We have a lot to celebrate. God has blessed us richly with all sortsof good things. Being a follower of Jesus Christ has its benefits.But this week we have entered the Lenten season. Our task is toremember. We are called to remember not only the blessings thatwe receive as Christians. We are called to remember that being afaithful follower of Jesus Christ involves a fundamental shift in theway that we live our lives.Our text tonight deals with this fundamental shift – this cost of discipleship. We find Jesus approached by three men on the road toJerusalem. Each of them comes with a sincere desire to followJesus and each of them is greeted with a dimension of just howmuch following Jesus is going to cost them.We begin our reflection on the cost of following Jesus in verse 57:“As they were walking along the road, a man said to Jesus, ‘I willfollow you wherever you go.’”Matthew 8:19 tells us that this man was a teacher of the law. Thisis going to be very important when we start to unpack some of thethings that Jesus teaches in the next few verses. But Luke leavesthis detail out because he wants us to identify with these men onthe road.He said to Jesus – “I will follow you wherever you go.” This is thetestimony of someone who wants to be faithful to Jesus. This is thesame prayer that I am sure has been on each one of our hearts. Ihave no doubts that this prayer is sincere. These men represent thehonest response to God’s call and we need to see a little bit of ourselves in each one of them.And so in verse 58 Jesus replies to the first man and this is really areply to our own faithful prayer. He said: “Foxes have holes and
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 birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to layhis head.”Contained in these words is the first cost of discipleship.
I. Following Jesus means leaving the safety of the worldbehind.
It is so important for us to understand that these words are spokenin a Jewish context. This is why we have to know that this was ateacher of the law that Jesus was talking to. When he said that theSon of Man would have no place to lay his head he was talkingabout more than just not having a home or finding a place to sleep.Jesus was telling this Jewish man that following him meant leavingthe Land and returning to the wilderness.For an Israelite, life in the wilderness meant constant threat fromher enemies. The wilderness represents a place where God’s peoplecould not find
Shalom
.If this man – this teacher of the law – wanted to follow Jesus hewould have to follow him into exile; into the danger of thewilderness.
BRAVEHEART EXAMPLE
– One of my favourite scenes in themovie Braveheart is when the Scottish nobles and Army are on thefield of battle. The English army outnumbers them. They havearchers and cavalry against a group of farmers. The nobles wereabout to negotiate a settlement when William Wallace rides out. Hegives a speech to the Scottish men and then rides out to meet theEnglish messengers. The Nobles asked him where he was going – he answered back “To pick a fight.”
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