Journey Through The Bible
     Old Testament Reading: Genesis 18-20
     New Testament Reading: Luke 14

In the same way, therefore, every one of you who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple (Luke 14:33).

We’re all familiar with the marketing phrase today, “Have it your way”. For as many years as Burger King has used that slogan and I have gone there for hamburgers, I’ve yet to get one My Way—FREE! There has always been a cost.

We want things our way. We want our food prepared the way we want it; we want our homes and our possessions all to be the way we want them. And unfortunately, many people want to have Jesus but want to have Him their way. They want a fire escape from the flames of hell. They want to have eternal life with Jesus, but they want to do it on their terms.

The word disciple was the most common name for the followers of Jesus and is used two hundred and sixty-four times in the Gospels and book of Acts. Jesus has been teaching about the cost of discipleship since the beginning of His ministry. Here in Luke chapter fourteen, the teaching intensifies as the cross, marking the end of His earthly ministry, is now only a few months away. As we see here in these parables, many people came to Jesus wanting salvation on their terms. They wanted to put their business first. They wanted to put their personal possessions, the wealth that they had accumulated first. They wanted to put their families first.

But Jesus said unless you put Him first, and His desires for our lives first, then we can’t have His salvation. Even our own lives need to be surrendered. We are to take up our cross to follow Him. We are to love God more than we love even ourselves and our pleasures and our wants and desires.

Yes, salvation is a free gift from God, but we can only receive it with empty hands.

Discipleship is serious business. If we truly want to be a Christian, if we want to be a follower of Christ, if we want to be His disciple, we must put God’s plan for our life ahead of our own. We must be willing to surrender our possessions, our desires, all that we are, and come to Him with empty hands.

I think a great old hymn said it best.

“All to Jesus I surrender, all to Him I freely give.
I will ever love and trust Him, in His presence daily live.
All to Jesus I surrender, humbly at His feet I bow.
Worldly pleasures all forsaken, take me Jesus take me now.
I surrender all, I surrender all.
All to Thee my blessed Savior, I surrender all.”

That’s what Jesus asks of us, to surrender all that we have all that we are to him to be his follower, his disciple. It does not mean that we cannot have nice things, it does not mean that we cannot have a loving family to care for. We are to hold our family in high esteem as the Apostle Paul said, “anyone does not provide for his own family, especially for his own household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” (1 Timothy 5:8) We are to care for our family, we are to take care of our loved ones, but they are to come second place in our life, as we put God first.