An Issue of Allegiance and Investment...

At the church where I serve, we have been looking at various encounters that people had with Jesus that are recorded for us in an account of Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of Luke. This week, I would like for us to look at another encounter that and individual had with Jesus. And as we look at this encounter that this individual had with Jesus, we will discover another timeless truth that can occur when we encounter Jesus. So let’s discover that timeless truth together, beginning in Luke 14:25:

Now large crowds were going along with Him; and He turned and said to them, ²⁶ "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.

Luke begins this section of his account of Jesus life by providing for us the context for this encounter with Jesus that we are going to look at this morning. Luke explains that as Jesus was traveling toward the city of Jerusalem, large crowds were accompanying Him. You see, right before this event from history, Jesus told a parable to the crowds to reveal the reality that the claims of Christ and the message of the gospel provide an open and compelling invitation to all of humanity.

Regardless of one’s age or stage in life; regardless of one’s socioeconomic or racial status; regardless of one’s level of skepticism about God, Jesus invites all of humanity to experience the forgiveness of their selfishness and rebellion and the relationship with God that they were created for by believing, trusting, and following Him as Lord and leader. And the large crowds that had heard Jesus parable were responding to Jesus parable by following Jesus as He traveled towards Jerusalem.

These crowds were drawn to Jesus because of the miraculous activity that He was doing. Jesus was healing people physically. Jesus was healing people from spiritual oppression by casting out demons. Jesus had, on two occasions, fed thousands of people. And as a result of the miraculous activity of Jesus and open invitation of Jesus to follow Him, large groups of people decided they would follow Jesus.

However, Luke tells us that Jesus, upon seeing the large crowds that were accompanying Him, turned to the crowds and made an amazing statement: "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.” In other words, Jesus seems to be saying that we cannot be one of His followers unless we hate our family members.  

Now, as soon as we hear this statement by Jesus, several questions come to mind, don’t they? I mean is Jesus telling us to hate our family? That does not seem to make sense, does it? And to hate our own life? That seems kind of harsh, doesn’t it? And that seems pretty unrealistic. So is Jesus really saying that we cannot follow Him unless we hate our family? Is Jesus calling us to break off all relationships with our family so that we can follow Him?

To understand what Jesus is communicating here, we need to understand that the issue that Jesus is addressing here is not the issue of our relationships with our relatives. Instead, the issue that Jesus is addressing here is the issue of allegiance. Jesus here is using hyperbole and is making a metaphorical statement in order to make a comparison. Jesus uses the word hate to create the stark contrast when it comes to the level of our allegiance to Jesus as compared to our allegiance to our family. Jesus was calling the crowds listening to understand that their love and allegiance to Jesus should be so great that it would make it look like they hated their family by comparison.

Now a natural question that arises at this point is “Well Dave, why would Jesus ask us to do that?” By making this statement, Jesus is revealing for us the reality that if we as followers care more about family or ourselves than Jesus, then that is what we will choose when persecution or difficult times come. Jesus is making the demand to the crowds listening, and to His followers throughout history, that our primary allegiance must be to Him. As followers of Jesus, our allegiance is to be to Jesus first and foremost, even over our allegiance to our family.

Now you might be here this morning, and you may be thinking to yourself “well that seems like Jesus is asking an awful lot of His followers. Jesus seems to want us to be pretty committed to Him”. Well if you think that Jesus is asking a lot here, just look at what Jesus says next in verse 27:

"Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.

Jesus follows up His difficult statement in with an even stiffer demand of His followers: "Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.” Jesus seems to be saying that we cannot be one of His followers unless we carry our own cross. But what does that mean? I do not believe that Jesus is demanding that we literally make a cross and carry it with us wherever we go. I do not believe that Jesus is telling us that every follower of Jesus is going to die because of their faith, although for some that will be the case.

The issue that Jesus is addressing here has to do with what we do with the kingdom mission that we have been given by Jesus. The demand that Jesus was making to the crowds listening, and to His followers throughout history, is that we embrace the kingdom mission that He has given us, just as He embraced the kingdom mission that was given to Him.

Jesus kingdom mission was to enter into humanity to live the life we were created to live but refused to live, and then willingly allow Himself to be treated as though He lived our selfish and sinful lives, through His death on the cross, so that God the Father could treat us as though we lived Jesus perfect life. Our kingdom mission is to partner together as a part of the body of Christ, the church, to be the vehicle that God uses to reveal Jesus to a lost, hurting and broken world. And Jesus demands not only our allegiance to Him first and foremost; Jesus also demands that we embrace and invest our lives in the kingdom mission that He has given us.

I am not saying that Jesus wants your allegiance and investment. And Jesus is not saying that He wants our allegiance and investment. What I am saying is that Jesus is saying is that He demands our allegiance and investment. Now you might be here this morning and at this point you are thinking to yourself “Well, Dave you are just taking Jesus words too seriously. Dave you are misunderstanding what Jesus is saying in these verses when it comes to His expectations and demands for His followers”. How can we really be sure that is what Jesus means here?”

That is a fair question. Fortunately for us, Jesus Himself provides the answer to those questions in the verses that follow. Tomorrow, we will look at that answer…