The walk of the true disciple (Final product)

Introduction

*take a moment to breath*

*When speaking Take it slow and don’t rush*

Good Morning Church! I am super excited to be with you today!

As Tom previously mentioned my name is Zach Honnen and I am a student at the River Church’s pastors academy.

it is such an honor to be able to open up Gods word with you today.

• When I was originally given this assignment, I was told I was allowed to choose my own passage of scripture

• and when making this decision, I struggled, choosing for quite a while.

• I originally considered a sermon on revelation,

but then I quickly realized that I didn’t feel like revelation was the passage God would have me present to you today.

• so I went back to the drawing board and began praying to see what the Lord would have me preach on.

And one day I was reading in Matthew chapter 16 for my own personal Bible reading

and I Got to verse 24 and kept rereading the same section over and over again

And then I realized that section of scripture was the first passage of scripture that I ever shared before a group of people

And that was Back in 2021 i was in Windsor Colorado at a missionary society, called Ellerslie.

And Ellerslie had a section in the curriculum called, “always be ready”

And during this time, all of the students would have one minute to pick a scripture and prepare a short message on that section.

Let me tell you i was tariffed!

Now this was the very first night that we were doing this for the semester

And every single one of the student’s names were in a hat and chosen at random

so in my head i had figure it wasn’t likely that I would be chosen

but when the minute had passed and they pulled the name out of that hat Guess who it was?

As the Lord had it i was the first person of the semester to speak

And this was my first time ever sharing scripture before an audience of more then a couple friends

So i was tariffed but none the less I stepped up to the stage

took the mic and began to read and preach the passage for about 30 seconds

and then sat back down shaking

• The reason I tell you this story is because the passage that I spoke on that day was Matthew sixteen

So i am super excited to get to preach this passage today

and i’m even more excited that I Had much more time than a few minutes to prepare.

BUT before we go any farther lets read our passage and and Go to the Lord in pray.

Main passage

Matthew 16 : 24-27 ESV

24 Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? 27 For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done.

Prayer

• Lord, today, we seek you, we seek your wisdom we seek your understanding, and we ask the Holy Spirit to be with us. Lord, I ask for everyone here myself included to view our lives through the lens of eternity instead of the lens of the here and then now…

Context:

• we continue through a Passage. It’s always good to have a little bit more context.

• just before back in verse 16 peter declares that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, and Jesus calls him blessed.

• and skipping down to verse 21 we see that Jesus begins to explain to his disciples

• he must suffer many things… much persecution from the scribes and Pharisees

• and ultimately he would die and be raised from the dead on the third day

• when Peter heard this, he began to rebuke, Jesus, he began to basically tell Jesus that he was wrong

• that this would never happen to him

•But Jesus replied to peter, in verse 23 

“Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

• Peters mind was on the things of this world, Peter understood the Messiah, to be someone who would overthrow the Roman empire

• establish an earthly throne in Israel

• so suffering, pain, and death were the furthest thing from his mind when it came to the Messiah

• and that brings us to verse 24 where Jesus says to His disciples

24  “If anyone would come after me…”

If anyone… anyone…

this is an open invitation…

young or old

poor or rich

it doesn't matter, Jesus says anyone.

It doesn’t matter our background our past or our skin color Jesus says “if anyone would come after me”

As Christians ,

as the church, we are called to extend the open invitation of the gospel to anyone and everyone

And this is convicting to me as I hope it is convicting to you as well.

I don’t get to decide, based upon my own biased, who I share the gospel with,

it doesn’t matter if I’m comfortable all that matters is, we are surrendered to Jesus.

Continuing on in our passage Jesus says

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

• for those of us who are seeking after Christ, we are called to a very difficult calling

• we must deny ourselves,

• and this calling is countercultural,

• our society says, DO NOT deny your desire

•Fully give in to all your desires,

•The world wants us to be so distracted by the things of this earth, that we forget who Jesus is

• and That we forget that we are living our life for eternity not for the here and now

• Our society

•Our world says the NUMBER ONE virtue is to give into one’s desire and cheer on those who do as well

•But Jesus calls us to deny the desires of the flesh

•To deny what is evil

• To deny sin and choose , Christ

•This is the first requirement of a disciple…

• This is the first requirement of us if we are to walk with Jesus

•But What what does Jesus mean by Deny?

• looking at the Greek

•Deny is from a Greek word, which means to completely disown, to utterly separate oneself from someone

• Jesus isn’t calling us to deny ourselves in the sense of identity, each of us have a name, and that name is known by God

• God created us unique, with purpose

•The denial that Jesus is referring to is the denial of the old man

•We are to deny our flesh, our sin nature, we are not to allow anything to take the throne of our heart accept Christ.

• Before Christ, we followed the pattern of this world living in sin,

• But when Christ brought us in, we were called and given a new life.

And yet we are still in our flesh as paul says in Romans 7:18 (ESV): 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.

•we are called to make war Against our flesh and rely on the ability Of the holy spirit to cary out the desire that Jesus has for us.

• As we look Throughout scripture, we see the same call to deny ourselves that we have just read about in Matthew 16

• Romans 13:14 (ESV): 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Matthew 10:37–39 (ESV): 37 Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38 And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

Mark 10:21 (ESV): 21 And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”

• The walk of a true disciple is one of complete surrender

• The Lord must be king of our hearts, For us to have anything else on the throne of our heart is idolatry

• Even things are good in this world can distract us from the Lord.

• to have, Father, mother, son, daughter, or even grandkids on the throne of our heart above Jesus is still a earthly mind set.

• family is a blessing so long as it doesn’t become an idle

• We are to have our mind on the things of God.

• not on the things of this world.

• Peters mind, in verse 21 was on the things of earth,

• He didn’t desire anything obviously evil, but his mind was on earth, not heaven, which was why jesus rebuked him

• And we can’t allow ourselves to make the same mistake that peter made.

• We need to learn from Peter and put our mind on the things of God.

Finishing out the verse

“and take up his cross and follow me.”

• as believers, we are to embrace suffering

• as Paul says in second Timothy 3:12

“ indeed all who desire to live, godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted”

• one commentator, put it this way

“ there must be a cross before the crown, suffering before glory, sacrifice before reward. The heart of Christian Discipleship is giving before gaining, losing before winning”

• we are to take up our cross, which, for the modern person is hard to understand.

•If I’m being honest, I don’t always understand the full weight of what it means to take up a cross.

• so I want to read an excerpt from a commentator, which I believe encapsulates this Or captures this extremely well

“To take up ones cross is to simply be willing to pay any price for Christ’s sake. it is the willingness to endure shame, embarrassment, reproach, rejection, persecution, and even martyrdom for his sake.”

“To the people of Jesus' day the cross was a very concrete and vivid reality.

It was the instrument of execution reserved for Rome's worst enemies. It was a symbol of the torture and death that awaited those who dared raise a hand against Roman authority. Not many years before Jesus and the disciples came to Caesarea Philippi, 100 men had been crucified in the area. A century earlier, Alexander Janneus had crucified 800 Jewish rebels at Jerusalem, and after the revolt that followed the death of Herod the Great, 2,000 Jews were crucified by the Roman proconsul Varus. Crucifixions on a smaller scale were a common sight, and it has been estimated that perhaps some 30,000 occurred under Roman authority during the lifetime of Christ.

When the disciples and the crowd heard Jesus speak of taking up the cross, there was nothing mystical to them about the idea. They immediately pictured a poor, condemned soul walking along the road carrying (which is an accurate translation would, mean "to raise, bear, or carry") the instrument of his execution on his own back. A man who took up his cross began his death march, carrying the very beam on which he would hang.

For a disciple of Christ to take up his cross is for him to be willing to start on a death march.”

To be a disciple of Jesus, is to be willing to suffer as Christ did.

as 1 John 2:5-6 say

“... By this we may know that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.”

As Paul says, in Philippians “to live is Christ, and to die is gain”

James 1:2 says “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds,”

• in this life we are called to be WILLING not only to live for Christ, which in and of it’s self seems hard

•we are also called to be WILLING to Die for christ

• we are called to live our lives as livings sacrifices daily for the glory of christ.

•AND This IS only posable when we see our need for Jesus

• and we serenader to Jesus, to the Holy Spirit daily.

• we aren’t trying to earn salvation that was paid for on the cross

• but the Christian walk, is a walk in the footprints of Christ

• and if we hold fast to Jesus by the power of his Holy Spirit, we will one day rise with Christ on the last day

•

• and when we are surrendered to the spirit He will transform our minds, He will renews our minds.

continuing on to verse 25 and 26…

25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?

• we are called to carry the cross, we are called to be willing to suffer and die for Jesus

• but the hope we have is that one day we will also rise with Christ

• when we pass away, weather in a comfortable bed, or across the world under persecution

• we will rise with Christ if we truly are surrendered to him

• a day will come for all of us when we will stand before God

• and if we sought after our own desires, if we lived for this present world, we will not enter the kingdom

• but if we were surrendered to Jesus, IF we have repented and believed in his name, and we are fully given to him

• “God will say well done my good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your master”

verse 26 “for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and lose His soul?”

. In the book of Ecclesiastes

• the author insists on the point that Everything is meaningless

• At the very beginning of the book it says this:

Ecclesiastes 1:2-5 NIV

"Meaningless! Meaningless!" says the Teacher. "Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless." [3] What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun? [4] Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. [5] The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises.

• The author is explaining the reality of life on earth apart from Christ

• But at the end of the book, the author says this

Ecclesiastes 12:13 (ESV): 13 The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.

• the chief end of man is to love God and glorify him forever

• and that is what Jesus is communicating

• to gain the world is meaningless, but to serve me and love me is not

• He’s yelling out to us, “ saying, I’m right here,

• I am a good Shepherd, who leads you to water and feed you and protect you,

• and IN ME are pleasures forever more.

• He says to us to “Repent and believe in me, surrender to me, the short life you have on earth, . And you will receive eternity with me.”

• Jesus is plainly saying to us, I love you, and all he asks is that we live and die for him.

• and the death that we die is more so the crossing of the finish line into the arms of our loving father.

• That is what Jesus is saying when he says “he who loses his life, for my sake, will find it”

•Jesus wants us to love nothing on this earth more than him. Jesus wants us to be saved because he loves us.

•he wants us to love him who blesses, and not just his blessings

(repeat this)

often times throughout life, even though we are believers, even though we have repented and believe in Jesus, at times, we try to hold on to our life

• we almost try to take back, what we already gave up

• and Jesus is reminding us that He is better, and He is worthy.

•Let’s move on to our last section verse 27

27 For the Son of Man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay each person according to what he has done.

• and this is our hope our joy and excitement.

• The day is near either by our death or by Jesus is second coming, we will see the face of Christ.

•And for the believer, this will be a joyous day, full of love, hope, and excitement, humility, joy, and gratitude.

•But for anyone in this room and anyone in this world, who doesn’t believe in Jesus as the Lord and king.

• And hasn’t surrendered to Christ

• Anyone who hasn’t confessed to Jesus as Lord anyone who hasn’t repented of their sin and turned to Christ, Jesus will ALSO repay them for what they’ve done both good and bad. And scripture says our righteous deeds are like filthy rags before Christ.

• You see

• The old testament shows us our sin like a mirror

• the old testament and the law show us how much we need Christ,

• and it makes it clear that the standard is perfection and no one can reach it

• The Bible says all have fallen short of the glory of God

• What the Bible also says the the free gift of God is eternal life which was paid for by Jesus on the cross

Romans 10:9 says  

“because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. “

• and Jesus said at the beginning of his ministry

“repent and believe for the kingdom of God is at hand”

•so today if you find yourself wondering if you know Christ at all please repent and believe in Him today

•But if you are a believer, who struggles to love Christ, the way, this passage describes

•Welcome to the club

• In our own strength, we will fail, and we will never be perfect on this side of eternity

•but my prayer… and what I hope your prayer will be as well is this:

“Lord, help me to seek you and love you, better today than yesterday, and better tomorrow than today.”

• and if you feel like the lord has blessed you to walk this out vary well alread, don’t grow weary of doing good, continue to fix your eyes on Jesus

In Closing

* today as we go Home let us have the mind of Christ and seek Him, His glory and His kingdom and not our own.

•And as I mentioned in the beginning, at Ellerslie they had a part of the curriculum called, “always be ready”

•And this comes from 1 Peter 3:15 which says

“but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, “

‌• and looking at my life, looking at your lives, looking at the church as a whole

• I wonder how often people ask about the hope within us?

•Often times I don’t demonstrate the hope of Christ like I want to

• Often times I find myself seeking to save my own life

• rather than seeking Christ

• And for each and everyone of us today, if we seek Christ,

• And lose our life in in the service of Christ, either literally or figuratively

• I believe that there will be many people asking about the hope within us

• because when a Christian isn’t shaken by the circumstances of the world, because of the hope, he or she has in Christ

• That is when people start noticing and start asking what we have Hope in

• and then we can start sharing the gospel more effectively.

•So church as we pray, let us seek first the kingdom of heaven

•Let us lose our life for Christ sake every day

•Let’s become a living sacrifice, and be fully surrendered to Jesus

• Because he is worthy

• Because he is coming

• And he will give us the strength to do this by the power of his Holy Spirit

Lets pray Prayer

• dear Lord, thank you for today, thank you for your grace and for your mercy. I ask that you would help me and everyone else in this room to seek first the kingdom of heaven. I ask that you would help us to have our mind on the things of heaven instead of the things of earth. I ask that you would help us by the power of your Holy Spirit to seek after you instead of after the desires of our flesh.

• Lord, I ask that if any of us have started to walk away from you that you will bring us back.

• If any of us. Have gone back to the desires of our flesh. I ask that you would bring us back to you.

• Lord, I ask for anyone who doesn’t believe in you, that you would transform their lives, and save them from their sin, just as you have saved me from mine.

• In your holy sons name amen.

Benediction

Philippians 1:20 (ESV): 20 as it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death.

• as the apostle Paul hoped in Philippians. I also hope that all of us, today tomorrow and every day after that, would live for Christ that he may be honored in our body whether by how we live or by how we die

• for he is worthy

• and with that have a blessed week