Counting the Cost - Counting the Cost

Introduction:

Turn in your Bibles to .

Background to Scripture: One of the things that I am hoping that you take away from this sermon is that Jesus invites all to come and follow Him, but if ever we get a sense that Jesus is offering easy believism where we pray a prayer and then live however we want, we don’t get that from Jesus.

Jesus doesn’t need followers, so when he presents the option to follow Him, he has no reason to sell it any less than what it is, an often difficult journey. But here is the catch....it’s worth it.

And it’s not a sense where Jesus is a drill sergeant ripping down his new recruits to make them. He loving says, this will be hard, but elsewhere says, I will be with you.

Let’s read what Dr. Luke wrote regarding what Jesus said.

Luke 14:25–33 ESV

25 Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, 26 “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. 27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. 28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ 31 Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32 And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33 So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.

Big Idea: Count the Cost of Following Jesus

Review: For the last few weeks we have been talking about the cost of following Jesus and the first 3 verses of this text serve as a summary of what we’ve talked about.

1. There is a relational cost. ()

Pretty simple right. Hate your family. But I don’t think Jesus said to actually hate your family. But your devotion to Jesus should be so complete that it makes other relationships look like hate. And sometimes, your family will think you hate them, but at times you are sacrificing them for the sake of the Gospel. Sometimes it means moving away from them to follow Jesus. Going to the ends of the earth.

2. There is a Lifestyle Cost ()

Taking up your cross to follow Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll be hung on it. But it does meant that your life will be different.

Now before we get into this any further. We have to acknowledge that the people Jesus is talking to aren’t actually following Jesus. They are stuck on the fence trying to figure out what’s in it for me?

This is not a condemnation of his followers for not being good enough. If you are following Jesus and doing the best you can to love and serve Him every day, let’s not create doubt in your mind. You are saved.

But if you are straddling the fence, it’s time to pick a side. Are you in or are you out?

But before you do that, count the cost.

Jesus then gives us 2 parables to illustrate what that looks like.

Application:

After a clear call for the followers of Jesus to abandon all things in order to follow Jesus, Jesus then gives us 2 parables to illustrate what that looks like.

1. Have you counted the cost of following Jesus? ()

Explanation: Jesus starts with a parable of a man who wants to build a tower. The idea is simple. Don’t just build a tower. This is not a time to “start somewhere.” Sit down and figure out what it takes to build a tower. What work can you do on your own? Where do you need help? How much do materials cost? How much will you have to pay people to help build it? What’s your timeline? Essentially you are asking the question, “Can I do this?” Because if you say you are going to do something and don’t people will make fun of you. I think it’s interesting that Jesus immediately went to “mocking.” This is not about failing. The truth is people fail. In fact stuff happens. Things we can’t account for cause us to fail. The economy, tragedy, and even the failure of others to deliver on their promises. There are a lot of reasons you will fail.

So no, it’s not about failure, but about poor planning.

Now the same is true of our relationship with Jesus. The people that Jesus was talking to were straddling the fence between being fully committed and following Jesus for the food he provided and the miracles. But following Jesus was more than just going where he went. It was going to actually require sacrifice and that meant soon.

He’d already talked about hating your family and taking up your cross. This all sounds fine and good, but you usually don’t have to make that decision until the time comes. But what happens when the times comes to either choose Jesus or turn and run? Your initiall profession that you will follow Jesus no matter where he went is going to be a problem when it actually costs you something.

And when you fail, people will laugh at you.

Illustration: But the disciples all abandoned Jesus when things got rough. They did exactly what he warned the crowds not to do. They did not actually count the cost of following Jesus because they would have known that this day would come. But in the hour of Jesus’ greatest need, they failed.

And this is where grace kicks in. The world may mock, but Jesus was willing to restore all of His disciples and then unleash them on the world. But things would have been a whole lot easier had they been preparing for this.

Thank God for second chances. Because eventually they got it right.

Application: Do you have a plan for following Jesus? Do you have a plan for sticking with Jesus even when life hurts and it doesn’t make sense? If it became illegal to follow Jesus in America tomorrow, would you be in church next Sunday?

2. Have you counted the cost of not following Jesus? ()

Explanation: The 2nd parable that Jesus presents is one of a king going to war. It would be a really good idea for you to have a pretty good idea of whether or not you can win the war or not. Do you have what the resources, the manpower, the firepower to destroy your enemy? Because if not, it would be in your best interest to figure out a way to make peace. Otherwise there is going to be a lot of pain and suffering and you might drag some other people down with you.

This is where pride might get in the way. People have a habit of thinking they are invincible, particularly when the threat isn’t necessarily on their doorstep. Even more when they feel like there is no threat at all.

What Jesus is trying to say is that there is a king coming to war…to judge the quick and the dead. To bring justice to the world and right every wrongs and wipe every tear. Paul put it this way in

Colossians 3:6 ESV

6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming.

So it would be a pretty good idea to figure out whether or not you can take the big man. And if not, then you should probably figure out how to get on His good side.

The truth is that the cost of following Jesus is high, but the cost of ignoring Him is even greater. And yes, if you aren’t following Jesus, you may be leading others down a path away from Him as well.

Illustration: One of the reasons why doctors suggest that you get a regular checkup is so that if a problem arises in your body, that you catch it early while you can still do something about it. The same is true about your relationship with God. So long as you are still breathing, it’s never too late to turn to Jesus…even if you have been fighting Him all your life. You can throw in the towel, wave the white flag, give up and He will welcome you with open arms.The story of thief on the cross is a perfect example of this.

But once this life is over, time is up. There are no second chances.

Application: Now this is mainly for skeptics and nonbelievers....have you counted the cost of not following Jesus?

C.S. Lewis said it this way, “One must keep pointing out that Christianity is a statement which, if false, is of no importance, and, if true, is of infinite importance. The one thing it cannot be i moderately important.”

So which is it to you?

Challenge: Sit down and with a prayerful attitude; Count the Cost.

As I was studying for this sermon, I came across this illustration in a commentary and it is so good I wanted to share it....The original source is an essay by Annie Dillard but really speaks to the heart of a journey with Jesus.

In 1845, Sir John Franklin and 138 officers and men embarked from England to find the northwest passage across the high Canadian Arctic to the Pacific Ocean. They sailed in two three-masted barques. Each sailing vessel carried an auxiliary steam engine and a twelve-day supply of coal for the entire projected two or three years’ voyage. Instead of additional coal, according to L.P. Kirwan, each ship made room for a 1,200-volume library, “a hand-organ, playing fifty tunes,” china place settings for officers and men, cut-glass wine goblets, and sterling silver flatware. The officers’ sterling silver knives, forks and spoons were particularly interesting. The silver was of ornate Victorian design, very heavy at the handles and richly patterned. Engraved on the handles were the individual officers’ initials and family crests. The expedition carried no special clothing for the Arctic, only the uniforms of Her Majesty’s Navy.

The ships set out in high dudgeon, amid enormous glory and fanfare. . . . Two months later a British whaling captain met the two barques in Lancaster Sound; he reported back to England on the high spirits of officers and men. He was the last European to see any of them alive.

Years later, civilization learned that many groups of Inuit—Eskimos—had hazarded across tableaux involving various still-living or dead members of the Franklin expedition. Some had glimpsed, for instance, men pushing and pulling a wooden boat across the ice. Some had found, at a place called Starvation Cove, this boat, or a similar one, and the remains of the thirty-five men who had been dragging it. At Terror Bay the Inuit found a tent on the ice, and in it, thirty bodies. At Simpson Strait some Inuit had seen a very odd sight: The pack ice pierced by the three protruding wooden masts of a barque.

For twenty years, search parties recovered skeletons from all over the frozen sea. . . . Accompanying one clump of frozen bodies . . . were place settings of sterling silver flatware engraved with officers’ initials and family crests.

Another search party found two skeletons in a boat on a sledge. They had hauled the boat sixty-five miles. With the two skeletons were some chocolate, some guns, some tea, and a great deal of table silver. Many miles south of these two was another skeleton, alone. This was a frozen officer. . . . The skeleton was in uniform: trousers and jacket “of fine blue cloth . . . edged with silk braid, with sleeves slashed and bearing five covered buttons each. Over this uniform the dead man had worn a blue greatcoat, with a black silk neckerchief.” That was the Franklin expedition.1

Sir John Franklin and 138 men perished because they underestimated the requirements of Arctic exploration. They ignorantly imagined a pleasure cruise amid the comforts of their English officers’ clubs. They exchanged necessities for luxuries, and their ignorance led to their deaths.

As we count the cost of following Jesus, let us never trade preparation and planning for the perceived comforts of the world.