I want to challenge your thinking this morning by asking you a multiple choice question. The question: in daily life terms, what is the purpose of life? Rank these five options with number one being the highest option:

Achieving success

Taking care of your family

Achieving a desirable lifestyle

Enjoying life

Serving God

I ask you to rank these items privately, in your own mind, with no one knowing your list. All I ask is for you to be honest with your own heart and mind. In your own mind and heart, list each with number one your most important consideration and number five your least important consideration [in this list].

  1. Now that you have made your selections, I want to read some New Testament scriptures for you to consider.
    1. Each of these statements was made by Jesus either to a group listening to him or to his disciples.
      1. I realize that each scripture must be studied in its context with serious consideration given to Jesus' point at the time.
      2. I am not going to discuss each scripture, but I hope to call your attention to a single factor all these scriptures have in common.
      3. As we read together (you are encouraged to follow each reading on the screen), ask yourself what do these scriptures share in common.
    2. Scriptures:
      1. Matthew 8:19-22 Then a scribe came and said to Him, "Teacher, I will follow You wherever You go." Jesus said to him, "The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head." Another of the disciples said to Him, "Lord, permit me first to go and bury my father." But Jesus said to him, "Follow Me, and allow the dead to bury their own dead."
      9. Luke 18:26-34 They who heard it said, "Then who can be saved?" But He said, "The things that are impossible with people are possible with God." Peter said, "Behold, we have left our own homes and followed You." And He said to them, "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times as much at this time and in the age to come, eternal life." Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, "Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things which are written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished. For He will be handed over to the Gentiles, and will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon, and after they have scourged Him, they will kill Him; and the third day He will rise again." But the disciples understood none of these things, and the meaning of this statement was hidden from them, and they did not comprehend the things that were said.
    3. What do all these passages have in common?
      1. There may be more than one thing they share in common, but one thing is obvious to me.
      2. The obvious: Jesus did not ask people to follow him because it would be to their physical advantage.
        1. Jesus' call to discipleship never included promises of "here and now" physical prosperity as a part of the call.
        2. He called people to a sacrificial existence, not to a prosperous existence.

  2. In his ministry and his teachings, Jesus redefined the meaning of following God.
    1. Jesus redefined following God in a religious society composed of people who were convinced that they were following God.
      1. Both the Pharisees and the Sadducees had their definition of what it meant to belong to God.
      2. Each of their definitions included:
        1. Prosperity
        2. Power
        3. Prominence
        4. Prestige
      3. Jesus said, "No! Belonging to God, following me involves sacrificial service."
    2. These people who considered themselves to be God's personal representatives did much more than disagree with Jesus.
      1. They did not like his emphasis!
      2. Jesus' emphasis was the exact opposite of their emphasis!
      3. His emphasis was too expensive; it meant they were mistaken about God!
      4. So they killed Jesus thinking they would shut him up, but they just verified the truth of what he said.

  3. The conflict between godliness and evil in this world is very real--all the time!
    1. The older I become, the more profoundly I believe that is the truth.
      1. We live in a world where God and Satan are at war.
      2. This is the last battleground--the judgment that will come when this present physical world ends will also end the war.
      3. Of this each of us can be certain: following Jesus Christ will cost us.
    2. My enormous fear for me, for you, for the church is founded on the fact that we have swallowed the great deception without so much as blinking.
      1. We believe that we can combine being Jesus' disciples with enjoying what we consider to be the best that this world has to offer.
      2. We see no conflict because we believe life's purpose is pleasurable happiness.
      3. Thus when crises come, we conclude that either our God or our faith has failed.

It is difficult to exist in a prosperous society dedicated to pleasure and live for God's world to come. It is too easy in a prosperous society to blame God for Satan's actions.

The question: whose world do we live for? Have we considered the cost?

David Chadwell

West-Ark Church of Christ, Fort Smith, AR
Morning Sermon, 2 June 2002

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