The Four Great Invitations - Follow Me, Part 1

What does it mean to be a follower? On social media, you can follow famous people or popular causes. But why do we do that? What is the psychology of who or what we follow?

And what might it mean to be a follower of Jesus? That's today. Stay with me. Welcome to this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. The mission of these daily programs is to intentionally disciple Christians through the Bible teaching of Chip Ingram. And we're in the middle of his newest series, The Four Great Invitations. Well, today Chip will be in a couple of places in the Gospel of Luke, emphasizing what it looks like to walk in Jesus' footsteps.

Well, there's a lot of insightful content to get to, so get your Bible ready as Chip begins his message by highlighting Jesus' next challenging invitation, Follow Me. When I was thinking about following, the one thing that came to my mind was we all follow something or someone. In fact, if I ask you, who do you follow on social media?

You could give me some names, right? Or who's a celebrity you follow? Or who's an author that you follow? Or maybe there's a business person or a musician or an artist that you follow them. Now let me ask you why. If I literally had you jot down the reasons that I follow these certain people is because, let me suggest, you wanna be like them, you admire them, they've blazed a trail that you think you could learn from them, but everybody follows something or someone. In fact, there's a subtle one. Many of us follow what psychologists call a script, a script that happened over our family of origin and our growing up years, and the script developed where no one said you're supposed to live your life like this, but it kinda went like, in my case, you need to work really, really hard, never be lazy.

If you're sitting around, something's wrong. You need to be successful in school, so you need to work hard and get good grades. Because my father was a great athlete, you need to be athletic, which thankfully God gave me some gifts. And then it was both my parents were educators, and not just bachelors, not just masters, not just after their, you know. And so there was this script that you, by the way, also, our family has an external reputation, don't ever do anything that makes us look bad. And so pleasing people and how you appear. For some of you, it's a script that said, you need to go to a certain college, and if you don't go to a certain college or university or you need to get certain grades, and there's certain professions that make you a someone, and there's certain professions that make you a nobody. And we all have kind of this script, and some of us rebel against the script and say, I'm not gonna do that. And others, we have this unconscious, almost invisible hands that push us in a direction, and almost without understanding it, we're following sort of a set of vision, of value, of principle. And it often doesn't deliver at all what we want, and some of us don't even know, why in the world am I doing what I'm doing?

Or when we rebel, or when we say, I don't wanna do that, we find ourselves in some activities or addictions or relationships or codependency that makes life very, very confusing. And into all of that, Jesus says, okay, stop, come to me, I'll give you rest. And it's not just physical rest, it's not just emotional rest, I'll give you peace in your life. Take my yoke upon you, let's do life together, you never have to be alone again.

It's light, it fits, it'll give guidance, direction. From now on, we'll go through life together, and I know the destination, but I also know the path. I have a script for you that brings joy to your life, productivity, and as you follow, purpose. And what you find in scripture is that Jesus calls the disciples, and he calls us to follow. And the call to follow is a, you'll notice in your notes, I jotted this, it's an intentional apprenticeship. Sometimes we think following Jesus is sort of like maybe coming to a weekend meeting, trying to be a nice person, reading the Bible a little bit and telling someone maybe something that happened to you. But to follow, when Jesus said to the disciples, or specifically to Peter, follow me, from a Jewish mindset, and what this means is, I'm going to become an apprentice of this rabbi or teacher, and it meant three things. Whatever he teaches, I want to master what he's saying, but second, I want to emulate his life. So when Jesus said to them, follow me, he wasn't just saying physically follow me, or he wasn't just saying embrace my teaching, it was a, I want you to learn to think the way I think, to speak the way I speak, to act the way I act. So if you were following a rabbi, you wanted to become like him. And Luke 6 40 says, when a disciple or a learner or a student is fully trained, he will be just like his teacher. So the goal isn't simply that you get direction, you follow a path and you follow teaching, it's actually that you become more and more like Jesus himself. And so with that, we pick up the formal story in Luke chapter five, I'll put it in your notes if you don't have your Bible with you.

It begins there at verse one, and goes through verse 11. From the context we know that the early disciples, first they just started hanging out with Jesus. So in John chapter one, Jesus walks by and John the Baptist says, behold the lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world. And Peter, being a good follower of John the Baptist, says hey, where are you staying? And Jesus says, come see. And so they explored. And then we learn from the early chapters of John that this followership was kind of part time and they started to hang out with Jesus.

They became friends, they went to a wedding. He was gonna take a little trip, so he took a little time off from work and went on a little part time trip and they went through Samaria and he got to see a revival there. And so what you're gonna read is someone who's been exploring, who actually believes Jesus is the Messiah, he's spending time with him, he's drawn to him, and now we're gonna find this sort of official moment where he's called by Jesus to be a full time follower, to join a band of brothers who would embrace a message, align with the cause, and desire to become like Jesus and fulfill his mission. Now it happened that while the crowd was pressing around him and listening to the word of God, he was standing by the lake, Gennesaret, and he saw two boats lying on the edge of the lake, but the fishermen had gotten out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, which was Simon's, and he asked him to put out a little way from the land. And he sat down and began to teach the people from the boat.

He could have stood, but when a rabbi was teaching with authority, he would sit down. He's speaking for God now. So there's thousands of people, he's out on this little boat, so he's not crushed. The water allows the sound to be broadcast clearly to the large group, and he's teaching the people. When he'd finished speaking, he said to Simon, put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch. Simon answered and said, Master, we've worked all night and caught nothing, but I will do as you say and let down the nets. I mean, I think Peter's thinking, Rabbi, you're a really great teacher and you really know God's word, and you don't know much about fishing. The reason we get up before dark and come out is the fish are very down deep. When the light comes up, they come up to feed.

We've been here, we've got nothing. You don't catch fish right now. So there's a very important moment of this is logically impossible, what's about to happen.

But he says, if you say so, okay. When they'd done this, they were enclosed by a great quantity of fish and their nets began to break. So they signaled to the other partners in the boat for them to come and help them. And they came and they filled both of the boats so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw that, he fell down at Jesus' feet and said, go away, or literally, depart from me for I'm a sinful man. For amazement had seized him and all his companions because the catch of fish that they had taken. And so also were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partnering with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, do not fear. From now on, you'll be catching men. And when they brought their boats to the land, they left everything and followed him. Couple points to observe. Sometimes when we feel like following Jesus, really being committed, doing everything God wants us to do, I think there's a little bit of a, I'm gonna step up, a little bit like the few, the proud, and the Marines, and God always demands a lot and it's really hard and it's really difficult, but I guess I'll be one of those people. Or on the other side, you think, that's the way it sounds.

I don't think I really want to be one of those people. I like you, Jesus, but this is a bit much. What was it that motivated Peter to follow? It was his goodness. It was his power. He believed he was the Messiah. He'd heard his teaching. I mean, he'd just heard a message, likely the Sermon on the Mount. But it was this generosity. It was, if what you really want out of life is a lot of fish, or a lot of money, or a lot of fame, or a lot of likes, or a lot of stuff, or a house here and a house there and a house there, and to get to drive this kind of car, if that's really what you want, Pete, watch this. And in that moment, what he realized is, you're the author of life. My real direction, what really matters, how I was made, the script that the eternal God of the universe has for me. And he recognized, as he got close, you are not only powerful and good, but you are holy.

I am not fit. I don't belong with someone as pure and holy and loving and generous. And he says, don't be afraid. And did you notice, they left everything and followed him. I don't think he felt like he was making a big sacrificial decision, although what we know is he had business partners. We know Peter, at least of all the disciples, he's the only one we used to know for sure. He was married.

He's got a family. This is a big moment, motivated by God's goodness and power. And I was thinking about following, and I'll share some of the lessons as I've learned, but I thought, what exactly? I mean, if you could read through all the gospels and sort of have it all in front of you, Jesus wants him to follow. What does he want him to learn? What does he want him to follow? And so if you'll look on your notes, what I did is I gave you a quick little Bible study. I'm just gonna sort of give you a highlight. Jesus came, by the way, not as God, like with a Superman suit underneath and human flesh and acting like he was human, but when everything's got hard, he's really God.

No, no, no. He was fully man who lived in complete dependency on the Father by the power of the Holy Spirit, and every miracle he did, every act of righteousness he did, he did as a fully human person without sin, dependent on the Father. So he's going to say, how I lived and how I walked and what I did is exactly how I want to model it for you.

That's what rabbis do. And so the first lesson he wanted Peter and us to learn is dependency. In John 5.30, he says, by myself, these are the words of Jesus, I can do nothing.

I judge only as I hear and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but him who sent me. As Peter followed him and as we follow him, there'd be a big crowd and all of a sudden he disappears. In Mark chapter one, it's like hours and hours of teaching and healing and people crowding on and a great while before dawn, where's Jesus? And they go find him and he's out by this lonely place. He can't do this on his own. He's talking to the Father. Jesus modeled a fully dependent, I can't do this without you, Father.

I need your power, Holy Spirit. And he wanted the disciples to understand that. Second, he wanted them to get in on his mission. Jesus made his mission very clear. Luke 19.10 says, for the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which is lost. He wanted Peter to know, that's why I came and I wanna help you be an instrument of mine to seek and save people.

They're lost, they're hurting, they're struggling. The next thing he wanted him to learn was to catch his heart. Matthew 25, he said, when you see the marginalized, when you see someone in prison, when you see someone who's poor, when you see someone whose life is a train wreck, I want you to feel about them the way I feel about them. And what Jesus did, he had compassion on them.

He said, when you do it to the least of these, you're actually doing it unto me. He wanted Peter, this hardcore blue collar fisherman, macho guy to understand you need to be tender, need to care about people. God doesn't see as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, God weighs the heart. Peter, I want you to see that. The next thing he wanted him to learn was his motives. John 4, 34, Jesus said, my food, my motivation, what drives me is to do the will of God and to accomplish his work.

Not what people think, not what the culture says. Peter, I want you to know that if getting a lot of fish or being famous or being rich, I gave you that if that's what you wanted. This is even better, this is bigger, this is more important. My food, the motivation isn't that you use me to get your world figured out. The motivation is that you understand that God's got a purpose and a plan.

And that's your drive, that's your motivation. And then it's very interesting, Jesus wanted Peter to learn to die well. I think I shared earlier we do a lot of ministry in the Middle East and we did some training for a group that we partner with, a couple hundred of their leaders from throughout the Middle East and a number of the people that had come were from Iran and Iraq and some of the countries with, it's illegal to be a follower of Jesus. And as they were going back, the report we got from this group was, the last thing they asked us, will you teach us to die well? They understood that there's more to life than now, they probably won't live very long by being a follower of Christ in Iran. And it's just, and Jesus taught the disciples, unless a grain of wheat fall into the earth and die, it remains by itself alone.

But if it dies it bears for it much fruit. And so part of his journey is he trained them and he taught and then he modeled and then about the last 18 months the goal was put them into training so they would learn to die. Now he died physically and then three days later rose from the dead but they had to die to themselves. They were gonna have to learn to take up their cross and their agenda and follow him and it would be very unpopular. And so that's part of what he's teaching them.

And are you ready for this? He actually expected them to both think and believe that they should follow him in resurrection. Luke 22, I put it in your notes here, this is like the very last night and they're ready to go into the last Passover and Jesus is gonna wash their feet and we're gonna have all that exciting stuff that happens. But as they're going in they have a disagreement and they're arguing about who is the greatest.

I mean after three years of Jesus they're still arguing about who's number one. And Jesus gets them together and he doesn't reprove them and say you shouldn't be so ambitious and why do you wanna make such a big impact and why do you want, God made us to be that way. But he says let me tell you there's a different way to get there. He says to them if you wanna be great, be a servant.

If you wanna be number one, actually be a slave and serve other people. And then he says this crazy, crazy thing, you kinda miss it. He says my fathers conferred a kingdom on me and I now confer a kingdom on you. And these men have gone through it, he knows he's going to die, he knows he's gonna rise from the dead, he knows what they're gonna go through in the future. He says I confer a kingdom on you to these 11 and he says and you will rule with me in the resurrection and you will be on thrones and help judge the 12 tribes. He actually had a mindset that following him wasn't just temporal and wasn't just now but a mindset of a future and a resurrection and what the Bible would teach about a new heaven and a new earth and that you're a follower for eternity.

It's like I was joking last week when my wife was giving me a hard time like she says lessons from the first 50 years, do you think you're gonna live another 50? I said no but I think I'm gonna be following Jesus for another 500 million or zillion because after this body dies I'll be resurrected and I will still be following, I'll still be learning. So what I want you to see now is Peter's experience and then I'll maybe share some things that you can identify with. I think sometimes we think at least the way I grew up these apostles and quote people that were holy they were all in stained glass. I remember going to church we had this huge A-frame and it was all stained glass and you kind of have some pictures and I just thought Peter and Paul and you know they just lived on another planet and they just had it all together. Of course I had never read the New Testament but and I just want to show you Peter did you notice his first steps he just crawled like a baby small in faith it was a crawl he just explored then he explored some more and then he listened and then he followed him around and then he hung out with him then he went to a wedding and then he heard him teach and then he realized you are the Messiah and he came to personal faith and then it was you know part-time trying to take time off from work to be more and more around Jesus and then now his crawl becomes a bit of a walk. Okay I'm going to leave my business I'm going to leave my family for a season and I'm going to join this band of brothers to go into training to fulfill this mission to become just like this rabbi and so he leaves his votes and he's making really good progress and then Jesus says to his disciples okay I'm doing all these miracles all these teachings who do people say that I am remember this and they say oh some think John the Baptist raised from the dead others an Old Testament prophet and Jesus says no no no no who do you say that I am and Peter says you're the the Christ the Messiah the Son of the living God and he goes Peter that's not from you the Father revealed that to you so I mean he's declaring he's getting it and what's interesting is right after some of our biggest sort of great moments are often some of our lowest moments maybe some of you understand remember what happened next shortly after Jesus talked about now I'm going to go it's getting near the end of the ministry I'm going to die you know three days later and Peter takes him aside may it never be you know you can't die see Peter's got this picture of you're going to take down Rome you're going to clean up the Jewish system there's going to be 12 thrones I'm going to be one of your right hand guys I mean you're the Messiah you're the king you're going to make everything right and you're going to do it right now and Jesus remember his words get behind me Satan and you remember his explanation because you have the things of man on your mind instead of the things of God in other words here's here's what here's what Peter had in mind and it's so subtle and I've been so guilty of it personally what Peter I mean he's sincere right he's got the right doctrine he believes he's already made a huge sacrifice I mean he left family left his business how much more committed and yet what he wanted was the crown without the cross what he wanted was I want Jesus and I want to be a part of his team but I want him to make my world work out the way I want it but this crazy talk about you dying and all that that's and I don't know about you but I get that way in fact I think it's happened much in this country in some places around the world where we actually think that Jesus came and died paid the price for our sin rose from the dead and we believe and trust in him and if we'll kind of do what's right his whole goal is to make us happy and work things out for us so we'll follow him and if we follow him then we won't get sick and he'll give us money and our marriages will be great and our kids will all turn out right and he never said he said no no no no I want you to follow me and I want you to fulfill my agenda and Peter blew it on this one and then he went from stumbling where he fell he betrayed him right everyone else will I'll never I'll never I mean flat on his face and then he crawls again it's interesting that the scripture is really clear that after the resurrection remember he appears to marry and then the text says in first Corinthians 15 that he appeared to the 12 but he appeared to Peter privately I think he basically just said Peter I forgive you and I don't know about you but I've done some things that I know were so wrong so bad the opposite of what I knew God wanted me to do and I've prayed and asked for forgiveness and I've known I've been forgiven but I don't feel very much like I'm worth anything or God could ever do much with my life and so after he crawls back in forgiveness he begins to walk where Jesus restores him John chapter 21 Peter goes back to fishing he comes in and he asked those three questions Peter do you love me Peter do you love me Peter do you love me and he reinstates and feed my lambs feed my lambs feed my sheep and he did it in such a way where he wanted Peter to to own yes you blew it you you were confident in yourself and you messed up it doesn't mean I've given up on you you've been listening to part one of Chip's message follow me which is from our series the four great invitations Chip will be back with us in studio shortly to share some helpful application for us to think about do you have a mentor that one person with lots of life know-how who you trust for wisdom and guidance well if not in this series Chip will be that mentor for us as he shares some vital lessons he's learned through five decades of walking with Jesus and he'll unpack how his experiences relate to four essential invitations Jesus challenged his disciples with throughout the Gospels don't miss how these biblical insights can encourage motivate and comfort you through all aspects of life learn more about this series by going to Living on the Edge org that's Living on the Edge dot o-r-g well chips with me in studio now and chip before we go any further today I was hoping you take maybe a few minutes and talk to a specific group of people they want to more intentionally follow God but they're struggling to find a daily rhythm to meet with them well what would you say to them well what I would say is you're not alone of all the things in my early Christian life I so struggled to be able to meet with God daily I intended to I wanted to I would set my alarm back and then I would go back to bed but here's what I can tell you we're in a very busy busy world with a go-go mentality and invisible pressure that I think we put on ourselves and what I learned is if you can literally start the habit of meeting with God first and do it on a daily basis yes it begins with duty but please hear me it will end in delight what helped me the most was someone doing it with me having that accountability and he didn't say this is what it says he showed me how to read the Bible how to study the Bible how to hear God's voice and that's what I want to do for you in fact one of the greatest things that came out of the pandemic was this idea of daily discipleship of literally meeting with people one-on-one it's called daily discipleship with chip and all I can tell you the response has been beyond anything I ever imagined it's not people telling me oh chip you're a good teacher or now I just understand the passage I'm hearing people say I know how to study the Bible I'm hearing God's voice God's changing my life so let me tell you how this works for each series I begin with a short teaching video no longer the 10 minutes and then there's a little assignment that I'm going to ask you to take 10 minutes on your own and do some study and here's what I know people that have done this with me who make it a habit just to spend 20 minutes with me day after day for somewhere between 10 days to a couple weeks they learn to hear God's voice they learn to discern the Spirit God begins to change them from the inside out this is a habit that you cannot afford not to develop thanks chip if you're looking for a practical way to transform your faith sign up for daily discipleship with chip at daily discipleship dot com through our new website you can peruse all our current courses and read some inspiring testimonies of how this free resource has impacted others over 200,000 people have learned to study God's word at a deeper level with chips help so why don't you join them and while you're at it invite a few friends to do it with you so if you're ready for a spiritual breakthrough sign up for daily discipleship with chip today by visiting the new daily discipleship dot com that's daily discipleship dot com well with all that said chip let's get to that application we promised thanks dave you know before we close today's program here's what i know for sure there are many of you listening to me that have blown it and the big question is hey chip uh okay if you've really walked with cod for 50 years i imagine you've blown it a lot could you give me a little coaching here on kind of how to get back on track and and i would say absolutely the first thing i've learned is i don't have to be depressed and try and punish myself you know um early in my christian life when i would do something i knew was really wrong it's like okay well i won't read my bible i feel really depressed i feel really sorry for myself and then i would avoid christians and that would magnify the problem what i realized was jesus is ready to forgive right away and he wants me he wants to restore things but i can't take it lightly the second thing i think i learned was i really had to be honest what i didn't like was the consequences of my sin and what i didn't like was the guilt but what i also didn't like was really owning it and i i remember hearing myself pray and telling god i was sorry for some things at one point and i realized i wasn't sorry at all i was just sorry for how bad i felt and and i just needed to be honest and say you know lord i i really like that particular sin i don't want to like it i know it breaks our fellowship there's a verse in psalm 145 verse 18 says the lord is near to those who call upon him to those who call upon him in truth i think one of the hardest things is to really be honest and then i think the third is i've learned i can't get back on track by myself i got to be able to share this with someone i can really trust and whether that's a mentor a pastor a small group a counselor you don't get out of being the peter that failed to the peter that helped change the world by wallowing in your pain being semi-honest and having the same patterns in your life that you had before so let me encourage you just respond you now know what you need to do get honest get real talk to someone you can trust and take those next steps god will meet you thanks chip before we close i want to thank each of you who make this program possible through your generous giving 100 of your gifts go directly to the ministry to help christians live like christians now if you found this teaching helpful but you're not yet on the team would you consider doing that today to send a gift go to livingontheedge.org or text donate to 741 41 it's that easy text the word donate to 741 41 or visit livingontheedge.org tap listeners tap donate and let me thank you in advance for doing whatever the lord leads you to do well until next time this is dave drewy saying thanks for listening to this Edition of Living on the Edge you