This message is the second in a series of sermons on discipleship. So, after a brief review of last week, we will look into our text at what Jesus calls the cost of discipleship. My aim is that Christ would raise us to the glad embrace of the cost of discipleship by the power of his glory and gracious promises.

Review of the Call to Discipleship

Last week, in the sermon from Luke 5, we walked through the account of Jesus calling Simon Peter to follow him as a disciple. I want to review three things about discipleship from last week as we begin.

First, a disciple is one who has been sovereignly called by Jesus Christ to follow him in faith. Jesus came in the power of the Spirit to Simon, revealing himself by preaching the Word of God and by miracles. Then came a personal encounter and the call of discipleship. Simon responded in faith, left everything he had and followed Jesus. I take Christ’s call to discipleship and his call to salvation as one and the same. Jesus Christ does the calling then and now by the gospel, by his word. To be a disciple is to be a believer; they are one and the same.

Second, every disciple of Jesus is called to make disciples. Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men” (Luke 5:10). He commanded all the disciples, to “make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:18-20). Simply put, disciple making involves at least three essential components: proclamation (of the Word), prayer (for the power of the Spirit), and people. We are all called to be disciple-makers. Therefore, remove from your mind the thought that discipleship is only for the “super spiritual,” the Navigators or Campus Outreach, the “fanatics,” missionaries, pastors, or evangelical monks and nuns.

Third, when we closed last week, I gave you the assignment of basic disciple making using the “3 P’s.” Very intentionally, I did not call you to sign up for a class or a mentoring program. Rather, I asked you to engage in disciple making at the most basic level. Simply, open your mouth to speak or read a passage of Scripture to another person, praying for the power of the Spirit to enable spiritual growth. If the other person was fellow believer, you were building up the body of Christ. If the other person was an unbeliever, you were doing the work of an evangelist. Both are disciple making.

Don’t Miss the “3 P’s”

Don’t misunderstand. When I said the “3 P’s” are the essential elements of disciple making, I really meant essential, bare bones and core-of-the-core. Implied in the third “P”— people—is conversation, connections and relationships of love in the rhythm of life. Classes, mentoring agreements, small groups and even church membership can be helpful in the life of a disciple and disciple maker, but don’t mistake signing up for a program with discipleship unless the essential elements are present.

Throughout the New Testament we see the church described as a disciple-making community—constantly doing the “3 P’s” in relation to one another. Yes, Christ has given apostles, pastor-teachers and elders to have special leadership and teaching roles, but let that not lift from any one of us our calling as a community of disciples. Paul says it this way, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God (Col. 3:16).” We are a community of disciples who are disciple-makers. Every one of us has been called by Christ to evangelize unbelievers and to teach, counsel, encourage and exhort believers.

Context of the Cost

Most of the books on discipleship I’ve looked at in my preparation have very little to say about the cost of discipleship. They have great things to say about the practicalities of discipling but not much on the cost. Jesus has something to say about the cost in this text. Let’s let him inform our understanding of what discipleship is.

Jesus is teaching “great crowds” according to verse 25, probably in the open air. So the setting is not unlike this moment; there are many people listening, some who see themselves as disciples and those who don’t. Note, this crowd is merely “accompanying” Jesus. I take that to mean that they are not yet following Jesus by faith as disciples. Jesus does not “tickle their ears” as some kind of a marketer might propose.

In our text Jesus explains what he means by the “cost” of discipleship.

1. You cannot be a disciple of Jesus unless you love him more than you love your family.

In verse 26 Jesus says, “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.” Did Jesus really say this? Did he really say that we can’t be his disciples unless we hate father, mother, children, brothers and sisters and our own life? How does this square with the other teachings of Jesus?

Elsewhere, Jesus taught that all the commandments of God are summed up in loving God supremely and loving our neighbors. Jesus himself, as he was dying on the cross, delegated the care of his mother to the disciple John. Similarly, Paul writes to Timothy, “If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Tim. 5:8).

So what does Jesus mean when he says that we cannot be his disciples unless we hate our family? It makes discipleship sound like joining a gang in the inner city.

Semitic Idiom

The key to understanding what Jesus means is to understand that he is using a Semitic idiom. In Old Testament language, to love one person more than another was described as loving the one and hating the other (cf. Gen 29:30–31). It was a fixed expression with a non-literal meaning.

We have hundreds of idioms in English that must drive people crazy who are learning English as a second language. For instance, “It’s a piece of cake.” “He just has a chip on his shoulder.” “I’d give my right arm for that.” “I guess he got up on the wrong side of the bed.”

In other words, if we take the meaning to be “love me more than” where it says “hate,” we will understand what Jesus intended. Let’s try it. “If anyone comes to me and does not [love me more than] his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple” (v.26). That makes sense.

If you think I just did violence to Jesus’ teaching, turn to Matthew 10:37. Jesus makes the same point in that text. Yet, rather than using the “love-hate” idiom, Matthew very helpfully records the meaning of the “love-hate” qualification for discipleship. “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Mt 10:37; emphasis added). That’s the first thing Jesus says about the cost of discipleship: you cannot be his disciple unless you love him more than your own family. 

2. You cannot be a disciple of Jesus unless you love him more than your own self, your own life (v. 27).

The second description flows right out of the previous idiom. Right at the end of verse 26, after calling us to love him more than our closest relationships he adds, “…and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”

Verse 27 continues that thought with a word picture, “Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.” This is a word picture. Upon seeing a man carrying a cross or a crossbar, anyone living in Jesus’ day would have known immediately that he was going to his own crucifixion. When the Romans condemned a man to death, they forced him to carry his own cross to his execution. So, the picture Jesus aims to paint in the minds of his hearers is that discipleship necessarily entails embracing our own death in some way.

Jesus said it slightly different in Luke 9:23, adding two helpful contributions to what he means. “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” So from Luke 9:23 we can say that this cross bearing entails (1) self-denial and (2) that it is to be done daily.

1. Self-Denial. The concept of self-denial reveals cross-bearing disciples practice some form of dying to self. Disciples say no to the desires and wants of the self that are out of sync with following Jesus.
2. Daily. The concept communicated by the word “daily” means that this self-denial is a lifestyle. It was never intended to be a one-time event, once in conversion or even at our own martyrdom. In this one word, I see the fight of faith.

It is from verses like this that Bonhoeffer’s most quoted sentence from The Cost of Discipleship is drawn, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him to come and die.” This is a daily call. 

Muslim Father Kills Christian Daughter

I want to read a very sobering account of a girl who loved Jesus more than she loved her family, herself, her own sinful desires and her own life. I got this from The Voice of the Martyrs. The headline reads, “Man Kills Daughter.”

[In 2008]…a Saudi member of the religious police cut his daughter’s tongue off and burned her to death for converting to Christianity.

The father…killed his daughter following a debate on religion, according to a report by the United Arab Emirates-based Gulf News….

The victim wrote a blog under the name "Rania" a few days before her murder…. The victim wrote that her life became an ordeal after family members grew suspicious about her after a religious discussion with them. She said her brother found some Christian articles written by her as well as a cross sign on her computer screen. Since then he started to insult her and blamed the Internet for pushing her to change her religion, Gulfnews.com reported….

Todd Nettleton, of The Voice of the Martyrs, is quoted in the article saying, “Our contacts have told us of new Christians simply disappearing when their families learned of their conversion, but now even Arab media outlets confirm the violent response of radical Muslims to Christianity.”

Jesus soberly warned us of this, “For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. 36 And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. 37 Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Matthew 10:35-37). Taking up our cross and following him, we must love Jesus more than anything else.

3. You cannot be a disciple of Jesus unless you renounce everything you have for me (vv. 28-32).

To set up this summary statement, Jesus tells two parables. I think the point of these parables is to put everything on the table with would-be disciples. None can say that Jesus Christ didn’t tell them that to follow him is to give him ultimate alliance, love and worship as the son of God.

Parable #1: Desiring to be a disciple of Jesus is like a builder desiring to build a tower (vv. 28-30). “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.’” What is the point of this first parable? The point is that desiring to be a disciple of Jesus is like a builder desiring to build a tower. Count the cost before you start and don’t start unless you intend to finish.

Parable #2: Committing to being a disciple of Jesus is like a king committing to war (vv. 31-32). “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.” What is the point of this second parable? The point is that committing to being a disciple of Jesus is like a king committing to war. Count the cost before you start and don’t start unless you intend to finish. The point is the same in both of the parables.

The Cost is Allegiance

Jesus has already made the “costs” clear in the idiom and the word picture. Following Jesus will necessarily entail loving him more than family and self. In the parables, he is making clear the necessity of knowing what the cost of following him will be. Now he says it this way in verse 33, “So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.” It’s a statement with a double negative. Any person who does not renounce all that he has cannot be his disciple. In other words, put positively, every person must renounce all that he has to be a disciple of Christ. Everything must be subordinate to Jesus’ claim on your life and incomparable by contrast. Even surrendering all the claims that other people might have on you; we see that in the family.

The cost of discipleship is considering everyone and everything, even our own lives, as secondary and subordinate to our allegiance to Jesus. He has supremacy. That is basic discipleship. As the Son of God, the Christ, he will call for supremacy in your life. No doubt about it. He will not be content to capture your attention at church on the weekend while you live for yourself, your family or any other idol you have set up as ultimate the rest of the week. He loves us too much to coddle us in our sin and idolatry. Christ demands supremacy because God is worthy of supremacy. The supremacy of Christ means that every one and every thing else is secondary.

The Danger of the Cost as Legalism

Unless Christ teaches you this with power, spiritual insight and a work of grace, you will see this call to discipleship as nothing but legalism. You won’t understand the cost of discipleship unless you understand that at its essence, discipleship and Christianity is treasuring God in the person of Jesus Christ. Unless you understand the gospel as a promise of a person, God the Father, through a person, Jesus his Son, to bring you to himself, you will interpret this cost as a bunch of things to do.

It will sound like you have to pay something. But you don’t have to pay anything; Jesus paid it all! It will sound like you lose something in coming to Jesus as his disciple; that’s absolutely right! That’s what Jesus means by cost. You lose something by becoming his disciple.

The gospel of Jesus is the promise of God to bring you to himself through the person of Christ. The cost is giving up our sin, our selfishness, our idols. That’s the cost and that’s the cross we must take up daily and die to. If you do not come to know God in Christ as more valuable and glorious than anything or anyone you have, you are not a disciple because you are not a Christian. That is the work he does in regeneration. He opens our eyes to see him as our treasure, our joy. This cost is no loss. We gain everything in Christ.

“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it…. The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field” (Matthew 10:39, 13:44). All that you lose in the cost of discipleship is more than made up for in the everlasting treasure and glory and joy that you gain in Christ.