And if you do not carry your own cross and follow me, you cannot be my disciple. "But don't begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it? Luke 14:27-28
I recently decided that the balcony of my apartment needed a change. Specifically, I decided that I needed a lounge chair so that I could sit and read comfortably from my balcony. As I decided what chair I wanted by buy, I decided how much I was willing to spend. Then, I looked for chairs and counted the cost. I counted the financial cost as I searched for a chair as well as the labor required to put the chair together. In my search, I found a reasonably-priced chair at Target that seemed easy to put together. When I went to purchase that chair from Target, I knew what I was getting into. I knew the financial cost and the time required to put the chair together. This story is not unusual. In fact, you probably would have done the exact thing I did and counted the cost. On a grander scale, when Jesus called people to follow Him, He also warned them to count the cost. We are going to look at this command from Jesus to consider the cost of following Him.
Luke 14 teaches us that one day, a large crowd of people were following Jesus, and he said three words that likely made them think seriously about their call to follow Him: count the cost. "If you do not carry your own cross and follow me," He said, "you cannot be my disciple" (verse 27). If that was not enough, He added, "But don't begin until you count the cost" (verse 28). To carry one's own cross was a call to give up his or her very life for the sake of following Christ. Because of this, Jesus seriously encouraged the large crowd following Him to count the cost of being His follower.
Most of us reading this do not fear for physical torture or imprisonment because of our faith, although that is a reality for many across the world, but there certainly is a cost for following Jesus. Following Jesus may cost you important relationships. It may cost you financially. It may cost you favor in the eyes of your boss. Understanding this, we, too, must count the cost. Where in your life might your relationship with Christ have a cost? Whatever the cost is, I can assure you that it pales in comparison to the reward. Just like we must count the cost, we also must look to the reward: Salvation and eternal life in Him. In the words of C.S. Lewis, "there are far, far better things ahead than anything we leave behind."
With your journal or a notebook, spend time thinking about the cost of following Jesus. What are the costs of following Jesus? What do we gain from following Jesus? After thinking through these costs and gains, write out a prayer to God, tell Him that, even despite the costs, you will whole-heartedly follow Him, and that the reward is far greater than any cost.
Read Luke 14:25-35 (NLT)
A large crowd was following Jesus. He turned around and said to them, “If you want to be my disciple, you must, by comparison, hate everyone else—your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple. And if you do not carry your own cross and follow me, you cannot be my disciple.
“But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it? Otherwise, you might complete only the foundation before running out of money, and then everyone would laugh at you. They would say, ‘There’s the person who started that building and couldn’t afford to finish it!’
“Or what king would go to war against another king without first sitting down with his counselors to discuss whether his army of 10,000 could defeat the 20,000 soldiers marching against him? And if he can’t, he will send a delegation to discuss terms of peace while the enemy is still far away. So you cannot become my disciple without giving up everything you own.
“Salt is good for seasoning. But if it loses its flavor, how do you make it salty again? Flavorless salt is good neither for the soil nor for the manure pile. It is thrown away. Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand!”
©2024 Sagebrush Church
