The Greatest Man Meets the Greatest Lamb - Part B

Following Jesus isn't always that easy. When you follow Jesus, it's not like everything just goes all down the river of life. It can be very tough.

Jesus defined true discipleship in Luke chapter 9 verse 23 when he said, if anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. How many do you know that do that? Self-denial in our society? Are you kidding me? I mean, this is all about self-indulgence in our culture. Okay, we might deny ourselves during this little recession, but just wait till it's over. And then take up your cross? That sounds painful. Do it daily?

Come on, what planet are you from? And we welcome you to Connect with Skip Weekend Edition. If you're familiar with Twitter, then you're familiar with the concept of followers and following. On Twitter, one follows various people one is interested in hearing from, and to gain followers, one also tries to tweet things of interest to others.

And while there's a certain amount of prestige in having a large amount of followers, the truth is there really isn't much required to follow or be followed on Twitter. Now, following Christ, however, is an entirely different matter. We'll learn what it really means to be a true follower of Jesus today here on Connect with Skip Weekend Edition.

But before Skip Heitzig begins, here's what we have for you this month in the Connect with Skip Resource Center. Women play a huge role in the biblical narrative. From Eve to Esther to Bathsheba to Priscilla, we find stories of faith and failings. Lenya Heitzig explores four queens of the Bible in her new teaching series. Here's where we see Bernice sitting right by his side. Unfortunately, Bernice is going to go with the flow, succumb to peer pressure, and remain silent. Hear more from Lenya as she explores four different queens in scripture.

And when you give $35 or more today, we'll send you the Queens of the Bible collection of teachings as our way of saying thank you. Peer pressure is a powerful thing. The crowd was watching. Bernice was watching.

Agrippa was watching. And you know you do stupid things in peer pressure. You'll say you don't like a movie you really like because everybody else says they don't like it. Whatever it is, you'll succumb to the peer pressure. Get your copy of these special teachings.

Visit connectwithskip.com slash offer to give online securely today or call 800-922-1888. Turn once again in your Bibles to John chapter one. Let's join Skip Heitzig as he begins today's study with a book that's had a profound effect on Skip's life. I brought a little book with me this morning. I've had this book since I was a new Christian almost. It's almost that old.

It's amazing it's holding together. It was given to me by a friend, a mentor at the time, and it made a huge impact on my life. It's a simple title. It's just called Disciple. And that's what I want to talk about today, being a disciple. And it was written by an Argentinian pastor Juan Carlos Ortiz, and he writes, a disciple is someone who follows Jesus Christ. But because we're Christians, it does not necessarily mean we are his disciples, even if we are members of his kingdom. In recent centuries, we've been hearing another gospel, a man-centered human gospel, the gospel of the hot sale, the gospel of the irresistible deal. But all Jesus says to us is follow me.

He doesn't say where or how much he'll pay us. He just gives us the command. So I want to talk about following Jesus Christ this morning, because in John's gospel, we come to the first use of the word disciple. It's put in the plural. He uses it twice in verse 35 and 36.

And then he even goes further and uses the word follow or followed three times in our paragraph. So being a disciple, which means a student, a learner, or an intern, you might even translate it, and following Jesus Christ. And so the question I ask is, are you following?

Are you really a follower of Jesus Christ? There's a magazine called Leadership Magazine, and it's for church leaders. And there's always cartoons in it that poke fun at us and poke fun at the church.

And it can be humorous. One that made me smile was a cartoon of a grim-faced preacher. And he was interrupted with a little note in the middle of his sermon. And so he reads it to his congregation.

And he said, we interrupt this sermon to inform you that the fourth grade boys are now in complete control of their Sunday school class and are holding Ms. Mosby hostage. And that's really the problem, isn't it? The real problem is that we aren't so keen on following as we are controlling, we are controlling, controlling. The idea of surrendering our will to a higher will, a foreign will, an alien will, if you will, is foreign to us.

It's against our human nature. The great author G.K. Chesterton once said, it's not that Christianity has been tried and found wanting. The truth is Christianity has been found difficult and not tried. And what did he mean by that? He simply meant that following Jesus isn't always that easy. When you follow Jesus, it's not like everything just goes down the river of life. It can be very tough.

Jesus defined a true discipleship in Luke chapter 9 verse 23 when he said, if anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow me. How many do you know that do that? Self-denial in our society? Are you kidding me? This is all about self-indulgence in our culture. Okay, we might deny ourselves during this little recession, but just wait till it's over and then take up your cross.

That sounds painful and do it daily. Come on, what planet are you from? And so again, the question comes, are you a follower of Jesus Christ? Really?

Are you really one? Now discipleship following Christ comes in different stages. We know that. We come to him one way and though we remain the same people throughout our journey with the Lord, we change, don't we? We go from glory to glory. We get changed into the image of Christ more and more.

There's periods of growth and change. So I'm going to define discipleship. I define it as this, it is a lifelong process of conformity to an alien will.

It's a lifelong process of conformity to an alien will and we'll see that I think here. Now we get the privilege in verse 35 down to verse 42 to look at the first three disciples that follow Jesus. They were not originally disciples of Jesus, but disciples of somebody else and they become disciples of Jesus. And so we're going to look and watch their journey as they start their process of following and what it implies. And so this morning I want to give you five characteristics of being a follower of Christ. Five characteristics and with each characteristic I'll give you a principle that goes along with it, a summing up principle.

And here's the first characteristic, transition. Transition and here's the principle, every believer should be a disciple. Every believer should be a disciple. Back to the words of Ortiz in this book, he said you might have a lot of Christians, but not all of them are disciples, but every believer should be a disciple.

Verse 35. Again the next day John, that is John the Baptist, stood with two of his disciples. These two individuals you're about to read were learners, students, pupils, interns of John the Baptist at first, but watch. And looking at Jesus as he walked, he, that is John, said, look, check it out, behold the lamb of God. And the two disciples heard him speak and they followed Jesus. So this is a transition.

So this is a transition. John the Baptist is handing off two of his disciples to follow Jesus Christ. The word followed means to follow as a disciple. A calutheo is the word, to follow as a disciple. Okay, now these two disciples, these two guys, and I'll tell you who they are in just a minute.

One of them is named, one of them is not. They believed in God. They had the hope of a coming Messiah and they were following the teachings of John the Baptist, but though they were followers of God, though they had messianic hope, though they were following the teachings of John the Baptist, now there's a transition. Now they are told by John to follow completely, wholeheartedly Jesus Christ and they followed him.

And so here's the principle. Every believer should be a disciple. No matter what brand of Christian you are or Christianity you've been brought up with, every believer should be a disciple. Listen to the words of Paul the Apostle. He said in 1 Corinthians 1, some of you are saying I'm a follower of Paul. Others are saying I follow Apollos or I follow Peter. And then he asks, can Christ be divided into pieces? Now we might even add to what Paul said, though I don't want to add to it really, but we could take John the Baptist and say some are saying I'm following Paul, I'm following Apollos, I'm following Peter, and here I'm following John the Baptist. But here's the principle again. Every believer should be a disciple of Jesus. Okay, let's apply it. You might have in the body of Christ some who say, and that's okay to say it, I'm a Methodist. That's fine. What they're saying essentially is I am a disciple of the teachings and lifestyle of John Wesley and George Whitefield.

I love the tradition they bring. Nothing wrong with that. Others could say, well, I'm a Lutheran and they're saying in effect I'm a disciple of Martin Luther and John Calvin. Others could say, oh, but I love the teachings of John MacArthur or Charles Swindoll or Chuck Smith and all of that is fine, but you better be a disciple of Jesus Christ, not just a man, a teacher, or a system. And one of the healthiest transitions is instead of seeing yourself as an adherent of Calvinism, Arminianism, Smithism, MacArthurism, Jesus Christ. That is a healthy transition because those men, those people, those teachers, and those systems are merely discipleship systems meant to point the way to Jesus Christ.

Now, I'll tell you the truth. Any leader knows this to be true. There's always a temptation, whether you're a small group leader or a pastor or the head of a denomination, we love people following us. We love it when people say, oh, I need you and I learned from you and we love that kind of dependence.

We want to foster this, well, let me lead you and I'll show you what to do. But a healthy thing is seen here in John the Baptist is when we say, hey, you've been my disciples, but now be his disciples and follow him. And that's what John does.

He hands them off. They leave his church and they join Jesus. And later on, John the Baptist will say, I must decrease and he must what?

Increase. And that's exactly what John does. John fades away from the story after this section.

You'll only see him pop up once in a little cameo appearance in chapter three, but now it's all about Jesus. So it is natural to be drawn to a style of a teacher or a system, and that's fine, but it's unhealthy to filter everything, every truth, every experience through that one little filter or that one little system. So let's stop worshiping those who teach and start worshiping wholeheartedly and following Christ. That's the first principle of discipleship, transition. Every believer should be a disciple.

Here's the second, evaluation. Here's the principle. Every true disciple must sift through his or her own motivation for following. Verse 38. Then Jesus turned and seeing them following, said to them, what do you seek?

They said to him, Rabbi, which is to say, when translated, teacher, where are you staying? Now, this is the first time Jesus talks in the Gospel of John. These are the first time Jesus talks in the Gospel of John.

These are the first red letters, if you have a red letter Bible. The first word that John records Jesus ever saying, in fact, the first words in Jesus' public ministry are this. And isn't it interesting, the first recorded words are a question.

They're not even a statement. He didn't come and say, let me tell you, I am thus and such. First thing recorded is that he asked them a question. He sees them following and he turns around and says, what do you want? That's what do you seek means.

What do you seek is an older way of saying, what do you want? Now that question was not given for Jesus' own benefit. It's not like Jesus was asking for information, like he didn't know what they wanted. He was asking it for their benefit.

It was meant to be a searching, probing, evaluating question dealing with motivation. You know what a great study is, if you've never done it, take the time to study in the Bible on your own the questions of God. And you'll just discover that when God asks a question, he's not doing it because he didn't know the answer.

He's doing it because he knows the answer but wants you to know the answer or the person to know the answer because it's a very deep provoking statement that he's leading them to. For instance, the very first question is found in Genesis chapter three, Adam and Eber in the garden, they had just sinned and remember what it is? God says, Adam, where are you? You think God was asking for latitude and longitude?

Give me your GPS setting. He knew exactly where they were but it's a very probing, evaluating question meant to provoke thought, meant to deal with motivation. Now Jesus asked the question, what are you seeking? And he will ask several more questions in the Gospels.

One of my favorite is Matthew 16. They're all alone up in Caesarea Philippi and so Jesus goes, hey, who do men say that I am? Who do men say that I am? They give him answers. Then he says, okay, who do you say that I am? He wanted them now to get in touch with what they really believed about him. Here's another question.

It sounds kind of odd. Jesus to a paralyzed man in John chapter five waiting at the pool of Bethesda, he's paralyzed and Jesus comes up to him and says, do you want to be made whole? What kind of a question is that? To ask to a paralyzed guy, hey, you want to get better? It sounds almost like he's mocking him but he's not.

It's a very provocative question, very pointed question. Are you sure you want this? Do you know what this could mean if you get better? Your whole identity is wrapped up in what you do now. You're not going to be treated the same.

Life is going to be very different. Do you want to be made whole? Another question he will ask Peter later on at the end of John's gospel is, Peter, do you love me? And he'll ask him that three times. These are very, very specific questions to evoke in evaluation. So here's what I want to ask you now.

Who do you have in your life that will ask you the hard questions? Oh, I do that myself. I make self-evaluation. That's good. That's a good start.

We're told to do that. But who's around you? What accountability person, mentor, partner do you have to ask you deep provoking questions that will cause you to evaluate and spurn growth? It was Socrates who said, the unexamined life is not worth living. The unexamined life is not worth living. But I think Paul the apostle said it best in second Corinthians 13 five, examine yourselves to see if your faith is really genuine.

And nothing beats having another person to help you do that. And so Jesus asked the question, what do you seek? How would you answer his question?

If you were to be honest with him, this could be the most important question ever. Imagine Jesus turning to you and saying, okay, what do you want? What do you seek? Why are you here? What are you after? What, where are you going in life? I wonder how we'd answer that. Some would have to say, all I want is happiness.

Others would say, all I want is success. Others would say, well, I'm here because I want to find a wife or a husband, or I'm here because I'm lonely, or I'm here because I want to grow and learn more about you, Lord. It's a good question.

It should be asked. A book that I recommend if you have never read is by A. W. Tozer. It's called The Pursuit of God. I've read it several times in my life, and it's always a deep searching book. He writes this, complacency is a deadly enemy of spiritual growth. Acute desire must be present or there will be no manifestation of Christ to his people. He wants to be wanted.

Isn't that beautiful? He wants to be wanted. It's too bad that with many of us, he waits so very long and in vain. So they're following him because John said, here's the guy, follow him. They started following him.

He goes, what are you seeking? And the principle is that a true disciple will make honest evaluation of their life, take spiritual inventory. And I would say, do it from time to time. Here's the third principle, not just transition, not just evaluation, but the third principle is submission. Submission. And here's the principle. True disciples will respond to commands.

Let me broaden that. True disciples will respond to scriptural commands. Look at verse 38, the second part. They said to him, Rabbi, which is to say when translated, teacher or exalted one, exalted one, where are you staying? And he said to them, come and see. They came and saw where he was staying and remained with him all that day. Now it was about the 10th hour. And when they asked the question, it's by the way, a very unusual conversation.

Wouldn't you agree? I mean, they meet and Jesus says, what do you want? And they don't even respond. They ask him a question, where are you staying? And he says, come and see. It's a very unusual first introductory meeting. Now, when they said, where are you staying? Do you think that they wanted the street address or the apartment number?

Did you think they wanted something like, oh, I live at box 777 Nazareth. No, it's a very important word. I don't want you to miss this word. The word staying in the Greek language is one that you will find over and over and over again in the book of John. It's a key word to discipleship. It's the word in Greek meno. It means abide or remain or stay, staying. It's a key word because in John chapter 15, that's what Jesus describes discipleship with that word meno.

Abide in me and I will abide in you as the branch and the vine abide together and you will by abiding bring forth fruit. That's the word for staying. Lord, where are you staying? So what the disciples are doing when Jesus said, what do you want? Is they're answering it by saying, where are you staying? Cause we'd like to come closer and abide with you and get more information directly from you. That's what they were asking. They want to hang out with Jesus. They want further instruction.

And I love it. Jesus says in verse 39, he said to them, come and see. He didn't give them information.

He didn't say, okay, go down the street, turn left at the third block and it's the last house on the right. Instead of information, he gives them an invitation. You know, following someone on Twitter can be a fun distraction. It's often entertaining and occasionally informative. Following Jesus, however, shouldn't be just the distraction that helps us feel good.

There's much, much more to it than that. The good news is for those who choose to truly follow him, the rewards are great and many. And if you'd like a copy of today's teaching, just go to the website connectwithskip.com. Or you can ask for a copy when you call us at 1-800-922-1888. Each copy of today's study is just $4 plus shipping. We'll talk more about what it means to really be a follower of Jesus Christ again next time. So I hope you can make some time to join us here in Connect with Skip Weekend Edition, a presentation of Connection Communications. Connecting you to God's never changing truth in ever-changing times.