Life of Paul Part 20 - What a Real Disciple Looks Like

Good morning, everybody. Take a Bible, open it together, Acts chapter 14, and we're going to be continuing in our study of the life of the great man, the Apostle Paul. Acts chapter 14. George Barna from Barna Research Group published a survey this past week.

It just came out. And it was looking at the events here in the United States of America after September 11th. Very interesting study. Here are a couple of the things that he found that particularly caught my attention. Number one, he found that church attendance after the Sunday after September 11th skyrocketed at churches all over America.

It didn't matter what denomination you were, what kind of church you were, it just went through the roof. He also found, second of all, that now two months later, church attendance has dropped back down to the original levels that it was in August before the events of September 11th ever took place. And he had an insight, a conclusion as to why this is.

Listen to what he said. He said, and I quote, September 11th gave churches an amazing opportunity to be a healing and transforming presence for God in people's lives. But few people experienced anything that was sufficiently life changing to capture their attention and their allegiance. He went on to say, it just proved the old saying, people came back to church and rediscovered why they didn't come in the first place.

Now, when I read this, I was really sad. I thought, you know, what are we doing as church leaders here in the United States of America? How have we so lost our focus that when a needy population of Americans suddenly come to church looking for something, as Barna says, they don't find anything life changing enough that they decide to stick around. Well, friends, you know, the early church didn't have this problem because the early church had a very clear understanding of what their goal was. Matthew 28 19. Jesus said, Go into the world and make disciples.

And the early churches did not spend their time talking politics, planning bake sales or playing bingo. These churches spent their time consumed with making disciples out of people. And that's what we want to talk about today. We want to talk about how this whole idea of becoming a disciple really impacts your life and my life. And it grows out of some of our study of Paul. So let's do Acts 14 first, and then we'll come back and talk about how this relates to you and me here in the 21st century.

A little bit of background. Remember, the apostle Paul was the associate pastor of the church in Antioch, Syria, and God called him to go out and do evangelistic itinerant preaching. And so he left and began traveling around on what we know today as the first missionary journey of Paul.

He left here, traversed Cyprus, preaching the word. Then he went up to the southern underbelly of Turkey and went to Antioch, where they threw him out of town. He went to Iconium, where they threw him out of town.

He went to Lystra, where they stoned him and about half killed him. And then he went to Derbe, where the first missionary journey really came to its logical end. And as we pick up here in chapter 14, we find that the apostle Paul decided to go home.

He was just going to double back. He was going to go from Derbe back to Lystra, back to Iconium, back to Antioch. Look at verse 21, Acts chapter 14. The Bible says, Then they, that is Paul and Barnabas, returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, strengthening the disciples.

Hey, there's our word. Strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. The point is, in each of these cities, Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, Antioch, when Paul went back there on the way home, what did he find? He found disciples.

And you know why they were there? They were there because the apostle Paul had made them when he came through town the first time. He had spent time building disciples the first time.

And that's why they were there when he came back through town the second time. Now, when the apostle Paul arrived home, verse 28, look what it says there. And he stayed in Antioch. This is the one in Syria where he had been a pastor. He stayed there a long time with the disciples.

There's our word again. And remember, Paul had been here several years pastoring this church. And the reason there were disciples here is because the apostle Paul and the other leaders of that church had built disciples here in Antioch. Folks, you know, we can look at Paul's second missionary journey. We can look at his third missionary journey. We can look at his fourth missionary journey. We can look at everywhere the apostle Paul went in the New Testament. And the one thing we find is that everywhere Paul went, he left in his wake disciples everywhere he went. And that's because the apostle Paul had a very clear grasp on his mission, a very clear grasp on the target he was trying to hit. He knew what his job was. It was to lead people to Christ everywhere he went.

And once he had led them to Christ to make them in to true disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, that's as far as I want us to go in the passage because we got a question to ask. It's an important question. And you all know it. I know it's a little early in the message today, but I know you all are ready. So here we go. Real deep breath. Nice and loud.

One, two, three. So what? You say, Lon, so what? Say, I love that about Paul. I think that's great about Paul. I'm glad he made disciples.

But what difference does that make in my life here in the 21st century at all? Well, folks, listen, if the apostle Paul came to stay at your house for a couple of weeks as a house guest, you know what his goal would be before he left your house? It would be to turn you into a true disciple of Jesus. If the apostle Paul were pastoring this church, you know what his goal would be? It would be to turn every single one of you here today into true disciples of Jesus. If the apostle Paul were conducting a missionary journey in Washington, D.C., you know what his goal would be? It would be to turn as many people in this city as he possibly could into disciples of Jesus Christ. The so what that's here is that God's desire for every one of us today who says that we're a follower of Christ, that we not stop there simply being a follower of Christ, but that we move on to pursue becoming real disciples of the Lord Jesus.

Now, here's my question. If we were to be successful in turning you into a real disciple of Jesus, what would you look like? What are the characteristics of a true disciple of Jesus? I mean, if I had to paint you a picture of what a true disciple really is so you could copy it, what would that picture be?

Well, I've got six characteristics I want to share with you today of what a true disciple looks like. And here's how we're going to do this. We're going to go through them and I want you to grade yourself. We're going to take a little test. I want you to grade yourself on every one of these one to ten.

OK, here's how it works. If you've got this particular characteristic just nailed, you give yourself a ten. And if when it comes to this particular characteristic, you're on a respirator, you give yourself a one. And then you're anywhere in between that you feel like going and grade yourself. And we're going to see how you do at the end of the test. OK, here we go. Six characteristics that really delineate what a real disciple looks like.

Number one, a true disciple of Jesus is a person, number one, who lives under the authority of God's word. You know, we live in a postmodern society where we're told in our school system and every other way that there are no moral absolutes anymore. That there are no absolute authorities anymore for human behavior to believe that there are absolute rights and wrongs for things is antiquated. It's unsophisticated.

It's prehistoric. Well, I'm here to tell you that every human being alive lives under the authority of something. And for most of us in America, the authority that we live under is the authority of self. What I want to do, what I feel like doing, what I enjoy, what I like, what I want. See, a true disciple doesn't live that way.

No, no, no. A true disciple lives under a different authority. A true disciple lives under the authority of God's word.

The V I B L E. Listen to what David said. Psalm 119. David said, How blessed is the person who walks in the law of the Lord, who the person who observes God's statutes. You, Lord, have laid down precepts that you mean to be fully obeyed.

So I do not neglect your word. Hey, a true disciple understands that God didn't give us the Bible to serve as optional advice for us. God gave us the Bible to be the authority under which we live our lives. And that's why for a true disciple, the most important question that they ask, the foremost question that they ask when facing any situation in life is this question. What does God tell me in the Bible to do about this? And once they get an answer to that question, they do it. It doesn't matter whether they like to, whether they feel like it, whether they want to, because the authority that a disciple is living under is not the authority of self.

It's the authority of the word of God. You know, recently I had a person do some work for me at my house, and we were all done and we're ready to all settle up. The person, this guy said to me, he said, Well, you know, I really think you wronged me in a couple of areas in this process. And I said, Really?

Well, tell me about it. So he told me, and I really didn't think I'd done anything. In fact, I thought I'd conducted myself with as much integrity as you could through the whole thing. So I went and asked some people that I respect and said, Hey, what do you think? Did I do something wrong? They said, Well, we don't really see anything you did wrong. So the guy, I met a second time with the guy, a third time with the guy.

We couldn't come to any meeting of the mind. So I just said, Hey, look, my friend, I've done as much as I know how to do here. You go your way. I'm going my way. You get on with life. I'm getting on with life. And that's how we're going to do this.

Well, that was great. But then there was this Bible verse that I kept having problems with. Let me tell you what this Bible verse says. Matthew 5, verse 23.

If you're bringing your gift to the altar and you remember that someone has something against you, leave your gift in front of the altar. Go be reconciled with your adversary and then come back, make your offering to God. Well, this verse, every time I'd pray, this verse would come to mind. Every time I'd get ready to come up here and preach, this verse would come to mind.

And I'd say, Lord, but Lord, I didn't do anything wrong. And I've already met with this guy three times. And it's a no win situation. And besides all of that, I don't want to do this. I just don't want to do this, God.

It's just that simple. And the Lord said to me every time we went through that, Hey, Lon, did I ask you if you wanted to do this? I didn't ask you if you wanted to do it.

This is what I tell you to do. So I called the guy back up. I said, Hey, why don't we get together and talk about this one more time? He said, Why have you changed your mind? Do you agree you did something wrong? Do you agree with me that you owe me something?

I said, No, I don't agree with any of that. He said, Well, then why in the world are you doing this? I said, Well, I got this Bible verse that I need to read to you. And I read in this Bible verse and I said, This is why I'm doing it. Because God tells me to go the extra extra mile to try to get this straight. So let's meet again. And you know what, folks, you've got in your life situations just like this.

I know you do. Where all of a sudden you run into something from the Bible, where God says do something a certain way. And you don't really want to do it that way. Hey, I'm here to tell you that this issue, living under the authority of the Word of God, is the single most noticeable distinctive, I believe, about a true disciple of Christ. A true disciple has as their highest authority in life, not self, but the Word of God. And if the Word of God says do it, we do it.

Hey, it's like Jesus said, Not my will, but thine be done. Now, I want you to grade yourself. How do you do on this one? One to ten. How do you do?

Okay. Number two, a true disciple cultivates humility in their life because a true disciple knows what the Bible says about humility. Luke chapter 18, verse 14. Jesus said, For everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled, but everyone who humbles himself will be exalted. Peter said, God is opposed to the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. Therefore, humble yourself under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time. See, a disciple knows that in God's economy, the way up is the way down. And that's why a true disciple is always seeking to cultivate humility in their life. And the reason I use the word cultivate is because humility is not natural. Nobody is humble naturally.

If we're going to become people of humility, we're going to have to intentionally and deliberately cultivate it in our life by taking action, being proactive, and saying this is something I'm going to do. You know, I had a chemistry teacher when I was in high school. Her name was Mrs. Hinton. She made a huge impact on my life for good, but she had a favorite saying she used to always say in class. She used to always say, a word to the wise is sufficient.

A fool needs to be wrapped on the head. She used to always say that. And whenever she'd say it, she'd look at me. And I would be like, why are you looking at me when you always say that? Don't look at me.

Look at somebody else in the class. Well, I spent the first bunch of years of my life living on the back end of this little verse of hers. Even when I became a follower of Christ, I lived on the back end of this little verse of hers. And I've been down the road of having God have to teach me humility. Let me just tell you, it's much better to live on the front end of this little verse of hers and to do what the Bible says to go out ourselves and seek to cultivate humility in our lives rather than forcing the Lord to have to wrap us on the head and teach it to us himself.

Friends, a true disciple is a person who values humility, understands why it's important, and goes out proactively to cultivate it in their life. So grade yourself. How'd you do on number two? One to ten.

Number three. Here we go. A true disciple is a person who practices spiritual disciplines in their life. You say, well, Lana, I'm not absolutely sure I know what a spiritual discipline is.

What are you talking about? Well, there's a wonderful book. We're out of it this morning, but you can sign up to order it down in our bookstore called The Spirit of the Disciplines. And it goes through all the spiritual disciplines the Bible talks about. But I'm going to give you the major four.

Here they are. Spiritual discipline number one. Bible reading and Bible study. Psalm 1. David said, Blessed is the person whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and on God's law they meditate day and night. Disciples are people who immerse themselves in the word of God. This is a spiritual discipline that they practice. Spiritual discipline number two is scripture memory.

Psalm 119, verse 11. David said, Your word I have hidden in my heart, so I might not sin against you. Disciples are people who are memorizing scripture, hiding the word of God in their heart. This is a spiritual discipline that they practice.

Spiritual discipline number three, prayer. In fact, the Bible says in Luke chapter five that the Lord Jesus went away often and prayed so much so that the disciples came to him and said, Hey, every time we see it looks like you're praying. Can you teach us to pray?

Can you do this for us? And prayer, being on our knees before God, is something that disciples do. It is a spiritual discipline they practice. Last of all, being in community with fellow believers. Hebrews chapter 10, verse 24, says, Let us not forsake meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but rather let us stimulate one another when we meet together to love and good deeds. Disciples are people who are in relationship, who are in community with other believers.

They go into these communities to stimulate others to love and good deeds and to be stimulated by others back to love and good deeds. This is a spiritual discipline that they practice. Now, folks, we here at McLean Bible Church try to provide opportunities for you to do all these spiritual disciplines. As a matter of fact, we try to push you into these spiritual disciplines. As a matter of fact, we try to gently shove you into these spiritual disciplines. But we can't make you do spiritual disciplines. Nobody accidentally memorizes the Bible. Nobody accidentally shows up at small groups. Nobody accidentally reads the Bible and prays.

These are things that people have to be intentional about. And a disciple is a person who sees the need and intentionally makes the time to do spiritual disciplines. Now, how do you do on this one? Grade yourself one to ten. Number four, if we were to make you into a disciple, what would you look like?

Number four, you would become a person who accepts responsibility for their actions. This issue, accepting personal responsibility, is a huge issue with God. In fact, it explains why King Saul of Israel and King David of Israel got treated so differently. If you remember, King Saul, they both messed up. King Saul, when he was confronted by Samuel the prophet, what did he do? He said, well, it's not my fault. The people wanted to do it.

I couldn't stop the people from doing what they wanted to do. And why are you always picking on me? Every time I ever see you, all you're ever doing is telling me everything I did wrong. You know my daddy wasn't home much.

You know my mama played canasta all the time. Why are you always picking on me? Samuel, it's not my fault. You know what God did?

Took the kingship right away from him. How about David? David messed up. But when he was confronted by Nathan the prophet and Nathan said to him, David, you are the man who did this.

Listen to what David said. Psalm 32. He said, I acknowledge my wrongdoing to you, Lord. I did not try to cover up my sin, but I openly confessed my transgression to the Lord.

Hey, no alibis, no excuses, no justifications. David said, you're right. I did it.

I'm responsible. And what happened? What did the Lord do in response? The verse continues. And you forgave the guilt of my sin. David found mercy. David found forgiveness.

Friends, everybody in life messes up. True disciples mess up like everybody else does. But the difference between a true disciple and the rest of the world is the way a true disciple handles it. When they mess up, they accept responsibility without excuses. And then they throw themselves on the mercy of God.

And you know what? Whenever we do that, you always find the mercy of God. That's the way the system works. Let me take a break and say if you're here today and you've never trusted Jesus as your real and personal Savior, that the very first step to coming into a relationship with Jesus Christ is this one, accepting responsibility for your life, for where it is today, looking at your life and saying, hey, the reason I'm in the mess I'm in today and the reason my life is in the shape it is today is my fault, God, and I need a U-turn. It's not anybody else's fault.

I need the U-turn. See, God loves to show mercy, but God only shows mercy on the basis of people accepting personal responsibility. So if you want to do business with God, hey, God wants to do business with you, friend, but you've got to do it on this basis.

He doesn't work with people on any other basis. True disciples know that. And so grade yourself one to ten.

We're almost done. Number five. What does a true disciple look like? Number five, a true disciple obeys God even when they don't understand why God's asking them to do something. And every one of us as followers of Christ have these situations in our life from time to time. God asks us to do something. God leads us in some direction. And it makes no human logical sense whatsoever to you.

None. Hey, think of Abraham. God appeared to Abraham. He said, Abraham, I want you to leave your land, leave your home, leave your friends, leave your livelihood, leave everything. And I want you to follow me.

Abraham says, Well, where are we going? Well, I'll tell you that later. Well, how am I going to live? Well, we'll take care of that later. Well, where am I? How am I going to feed myself?

How am I going to make a living? I'll tell you about that later. Come on, let's go.

Now, that looked pretty crazy. But Abraham was a true disciple. He went. How about Moses? God appears to Moses. And now, Moses, I'm going to send you back to face the most powerful ruler on the face of the earth and the weapon I'm going to give you to use against him is me and a stick. Oh, you're sending me back to face Pharaoh with a stick?

Yes. Well, that didn't look real logical either, did it? Moses went.

Why? Because he was a real disciple and Jesus was asking him to go. How about Esther? Remember the queen, Queen Esther? And Mordecai says to her, Now, you got to go in there and talk to your husband and save the Jewish people.

This is what God wants you to do. Esther said, Hey, Uncle Mordecai, I don't think you understand. You just don't walk in there and talk to him.

You walk in there without an appointment. He shwacks people's heads off all the time for doing that. Mordecai said, Hey, Esther, I don't really care. This is what God needs you to do.

This is what you need to do, dear. What does she say? She said, Well, OK, if I perish, I perish.

But I'm going in there if that's what God wants me to do. And how about old Mary, the mother of Jesus? Gabriel, the angel, appears to her and says, Now, Mary, I know you're a virgin, dear, but you're going to have a son.

And when people ask you who the father is, you tell them God. Oh, Gabriel, I'm sure that would work. Nobody will ever have another question about that, Gabriel. That'll be just that'll be just peachy keen, Gabriel. Now, a lot of women wouldn't have gone for that deal.

You understand what I'm saying? But what did Mary do? Mary went for it.

Why? Because the Lord was asking her to. She was a true disciple.

She said, I'm the handmaiden of the Lord. Lord, I know this sounds nutty, but if that's what you want, this is what we'll do. This is how real disciples live. A true disciple says, Hey, if God's asking me to do it, I'm going to do it.

And I don't care how crazy it looks, I'm going to do it. You know, I've got a good friend of mine who just graduated from the Naval Academy in 1995. Wonderful young man, loves the Lord, wonderful follower of Christ. And all he'd ever want to do his whole life was fly jets. It's all he'd ever wanted to do. So he went to the Academy. From the very day he walked in, I want to fly jets. After he graduated, he selected aviation, went to Pensacola to train. And he said, you know, I knew if I didn't end up in the top of my class, I wasn't going to get jets. He didn't go out with his buddies.

He studied 18 hours a day, slept six, ended up second in his class. And he said, Oh, man, this is great. I'm going to get jets. My dream. The day before they were ready to select, some Navy brass came down. It was the first time they'd been there in eight weeks. And they said, we need two E-2 pilots this week.

We need two. Now, if you don't know what an E-2 is, it's one of these big four propeller airplanes with the big AWACS dome on the top that they shoot off an aircraft carrier. Ain't nothing even close to a jet.

When you were flying one of these planes, they go about the third of the speed of a jet. And he said, but we need your best pilots, the highest people in your class who have an engineering background. He had graduated from the Academy with an engineering major. He said, we'll take him. And so they called him in his barracks and they said, you know, you don't even need to come to service selection tomorrow.

You're going to be flying E-2s, friend. He went and talked to his skipper. Skipper said, nothing I can do about it. So he called me on the telephone. We talked for a while and he said, man, I am so disappointed. I mean, you just don't know how to disappoint. And this is my dream.

My life's dream just went up in smoke. I said, what are you going to do about it? He said, well, I've really prayed about it.

And you know what, even though it doesn't make any sense at all. He said, if God wants me to go fly E-2s, then I'm going to go fly E-2s and I'm going to be the best E-2 pilot in the Navy. You know, his carrier just returned from Afghanistan. He's flying E-2s. And of the 95 pilots on board the carrier, he was ranked number one of all the pilots flying E-2s.

That hardly ever happens on a carrier. And every time I think of this young man, I think to myself, now that's a real disciple. God asked him to do something that made no sense to him at all.

But he said, hey, you know what? God's asking me to do it. I'm going to do it and I'm going to do it with everything I got for the Lord. Now that's a disciple. So you grade yourself.

How do you do on this one? Number six and finally, a true disciple always chooses the option that honors God the most. You know, friends, I'm sure you realize that there isn't a command in the Bible for every eventuality in life these days. I mean, there's not a thing in the Bible about what to do when your computer shuts down.

If you have a computer crash, you will not find a verse in the Bible about here's what to do with a computer crash or a lot of other things. So what do we do? How do we know as a true disciple what to do in these situations? Listen, First Samuel Chapter two, verse 30. Those who honor me, I will honor, says the Lord. Hey, friends, what do you do in these situations? A real disciple looks at the options available and says, now, what option most honors God? What option most demonstrates integrity?

What option most demonstrates keeping my word? What option most demonstrates Godly behavior in a biblical worldview in action? A true disciple figures out which option that is, and then they do it.

Now, in 31 years of being a follower of Christ, let me tell you what I've learned. The option that most honors God in any situation is almost always the one that I least want to do. Those are almost always true in my life.

And you know what? I'll bet you that's true in your life, too. You find the option that most honors God and it'll be the one your human nature will least want to do. That's why only true disciples live like this.

Only true disciples make these kind of choices because they are people who are more committed to what honors God than what they feel like doing. Grade yourself one to ten. How do you do on that one? So we're done now.

Let's go back and review just so we can total up. What does a real disciple look like? Well, if you were a real disciple, friends, number one, you would be a person who lived your life under the authority of the word of God. Number two, you would be a person who cultivates humility every day in your life. Number three, you would be a person who practices spiritual disciplines. Number four, you would be a person who accepts responsibility for your actions. Number five, you would be a person who obeys God even when it doesn't make sense to you.

And number six, you would be a person who always makes the choice that honors God the most in any given situation. Now, total up and see how you did. And you know, when I was in school, you probably had a teacher like this. She'd get up at the beginning of the year and she would say, Now, I'm in my office every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon immediately after school. If anybody needs extra help, you just simply come by my office, I'll be happy to help you. Do you have a teacher like that?

Sure you do. You know what I noticed at the beginning of the year on Tuesday and Thursday? There wasn't a student in shooting range of her office until they had a few tests. And after they had a few tests and people started getting 20s and 40s and 60s on tests, all of a sudden, Tuesday and Thursday afternoon got a little more popular down in this teacher's office. See, tests do two wonderful things for us. Number one, they show us where we really stand.

And number two, they motivate us to go accept the help people are trying to give us. Now, we just took a test. Anybody here get a perfect 60? No? Well, I didn't either.

Okay, but here's the point. Depending on what your score is, it tells you where you really stand on your discipleship quotient. And number two, I hope it'll motivate you and me to go get help that people are offering us so we can do better next time we take the test. Here at McLean Bible Church, my friends, we have all kinds of things we're trying to do to help you become a true disciple. We have McLean University. We have small groups. We have Bible studies. We have men's events. We have women's events. We have adult communities. We have all kinds of things that are all meant for partnering up with you to help you become a real disciple of Jesus.

But, you know, it's kind of like Tuesday and Thursday afternoon at the teacher's office. A lot of times we look around and not enough people are taking advantage of these things. That's why it's good to take a test. If you've got a 20, you need our help if you want to be a true disciple. If you've got a 30, you need some help if you want to be a true disciple. And you need some of these things that we're trying to offer to help you.

Now, if you've got a 54, you don't need these things because you're already doing them or you couldn't have gotten a 54 if you're not already doing them. But, friends, if you're not happy with your score, we want to help you. We want to come alongside and partner with you because we have a core value here. It says that our goal is to transform people into fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. We want to make you into a true disciple. And because that's true, let us help you, okay?

If you're not happy with your score, we can help you get the score up so the next time you take the test, you'll do better, but we can't do it without you. So I hope you'll avail yourself of the things that we're offering here to help you. If the apostle Paul were here today, he'd point his bony little finger at every one of us and say, listen to me, your goal in life, if you're a follower of Christ, is not to get rich, not to get famous, not to get powerful. Your goal in life is to become a true disciple of Jesus. I hope you'll become passionate about that.

And if you do, we'll help you. Let's pray together. Lord Jesus, thanks for talking to us today about what it really means to be a disciple. Thanks for painting a picture.

We read this word in the Bible all the time, but we really don't have much of a picture of what a person like this looks like. So thanks for talking to us today and helping us get a grasp on that. And my prayer is that you would motivate each one of us here, that you would give us a passion about wanting to become a real disciple of the Lord Jesus, not just a follower of Christ, but a true disciple. So, Lord, change our priorities in life. Change the very way we allocate the time and the energies of our life because we were here today. Give us a passion about being a disciple. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. . . . . .