Consider the Cross, Part 9A

Turn with me in your Bible to the book of Philippians, if you would, for a moment, please, the book of Philippians, the third chapter, as we continue our study on On the cross of Jesus Christ, and considering the implications of the cross for our lives as we look at this morning the invitation to the cross.

We'll begin with Philippians chapter 3, verse number 17, when Paul says, Brethren, join in following my example and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us. Paul says, I want you to join with me in walking after a certain pattern, a pattern that exemplifies Christ-likeness. Earlier in the chapter, Paul would talk about pressing on and pursuing the prize, the ultimate prize, that one day we would stand before Jesus Christ and see him for all that he is and we'd be glorified as he him is glorified.

And Paul says, I pursue that prize. I forget those things which were in the past, and I press on to the upward call in Christ Jesus, my Lord. Paul was a man of passionate pursuit, and he would want to pursue that and inv all of his people to follow with him in pursuing that same pattern. And then he says in verse number 18, for many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you, even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ. He says, whose end is destruction, whose God is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.

Paul says, I want you to join me in walking a certain way, not as those who are enemies of the cross, but as one who embraces the cross. And Paul said this with tears. He would weep because he knew that there were many people who opposed. The cross of Jesus Christ. That's why, in his epistle to those in Corinth, he said that we preach Christ and Him crucified. He says, I know that to those who are perishing, This word of the cross is foolishness to them. But to those who are being saved, it is the power of God.

Paul knew that, and he knew that he would face people. Who would be enemies of that cross? He defines them for us. He says, these people have an end that's destructive. He says they worship the God of their own appetite, the God of their own desire, their own passions, their own pursuits. They're about themselves, or they're not about Jesus Christ him. And he says very clearly that these people have a destruction because they set their minds on earthly things. He would go on to say that our citizenship, though, is in heaven.

You see, you know those who embrace the cross because they understand their heavenly call. Those who have yet to embrace the cross, who are enemies of the cross, are consumed with the things of the world. See? And so Paul says, this is what you need to understand. Follow my pattern. He said it with tears. Why? Because there are many things. Many things that grieve us, but there was one thing that grieved Paul more so than anything else. Towards the last week, he had a great concern for the churches.

You can read about it in Acts chapter 20, where he wept with those Ephesian elders and told them about savage wolves who would come from within. He says on two occasions that he wept with them night and day. Philippi 3, he weeps concerning those who are the enemies of the cross. Over in Romans 9, he wept for Israel because they were unsaved. And I had to ask myself the question, as I ask you today, what causes you to weep? Did you cry this week? If so, what did you cry about? What causes you to weep?

What grieves your spirit? What turns your spirit upside down on the inside that causes great heartache for you? It grieves me that in the 21st century, the century that we are living in, is a century filled with people who no longer preach the cross of Christ. Because that's not the kind of preaching that attracts people. That's not the kind of preaching that people want to hear. They don't want to hear about self-denial. They don't want to hear about carrying the cross. They don't want to hear about daily bearing for Christ.

Those things that are not popular in the world. Several decades ago in the twentieth century. There was a man who was a prophet in his own right. Many of you have read a lot of A. W. Tozer. But he said something decades ago that was true of his day. And I want to read it to you because it's very insightful. He says these words about the cross of Christ. He says the cross where Jesus died became also the cross where his apostles died. The loss, the rejection, and the shame belong both to Christ and to all who, in very truth, are his.

The cross that saved them also slayed them. And anything short of this is a pseudo-faith and not true faith at all. But what we, excuse me, but what are we to say when the great majority of our evangelical leaders walk not as crucified men, but as those who accept the world at its own value, rejecting only its grosser elements? How can we face him who was crucified and slain when we see his followers accepted and praised? Yet they preach the cross and protest loudly that they are true believers. Are there then two crosses?

And did Paul mean one thing and they another? I fear that it is so. That there are two crosses, the old cross and the new. Remembering my Own deep imperfections, he says, I would think and speak with clarity of all who take upon them the worthy name by which we Christians are called. But if I see you right, the cross of popular evangelicalism is not the cross of the New Testament. It is rather a new bright ornament upon the bosom of self-ass and carnal Christianity. Whose hands are indeed the hands of Abel, but his voice is the voice of Cain.

The old cross slew men, the new cross entertains men. The old cross condemned. The new cross amuses. The old cross destroyed confidence in the flesh. The new cross encourages it. The old cross brought tears and blood. The new cross brings laughter. The flesh, smiling and confident, preaches and sings about the cross. Before the cross it bows, and toward the cross it points with carefully staged hist. But upon that cross it will not die. And the reproach of that cross, it stubbornly refuses to bear.

Listen. He says, I well know how many smooth arguments can be marshaled in support of the New Cross. Does not the New Cross win converts? And make many followers and so carry the advantage of numerical success? Should we not adjust ourselves to the changing times? Have we not heard the new slogan, New Days, New Ways? And who but someone very old and very conservative would insist upon death as the appointed way to life? And who today is interested in a gloomy mysticism that would sentence its flesh to a cross and recommend self-effacing humility as a virtue actually to be practiced by modern Christians?

These are the arguments, along with many more flippant still, which are brought forward to give an appearance of wisdom to the hollow and meaningless cross of popular Christianity. He is so right. He goes on to say in his book, The Pursuit of God, The Pursuit of Man. He says, what we need in this day and age is some lone voice, some prophet to call the church to repentance. Or to be judged by God. He's right. I volunteer to be that prophet. I want you to volunteer to be their prophet as well. I want you to speak the truth to people about Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

That is our m. That is what we are to give. So, Jesus. One day gives an invitation to the cross. It's before he ever reaches Jerusalem, it's before he ever reaches Calvary. It's before he ever dies on the cross. But he gives the message. And I wish I had a lot of time today. I don't have a lot of time. But what I'm going to give you today will be a synopsis of what I have given to you many, many weeks ago, many months ago, over a five-week segment. In Luke chapter 14, verses 25 to 35. So if you have your Bible, I would invite you to turn to that portion of Scripture with me this morning.

Luke chapter 14, verses 25 to 35. And in the brief time that we have together this morning, I want to cover just four points with you. Just four. We're going to look at the crowd and its curiosity, then the Christ and his concern.

Then the call and its cost. And then the consideration and your commitment. Four simple points. That Christ gives, helping us understand his invitation to the cross. The text begins in verse number 25. Now great multitudes were going al with him. We 'll stop right there. Great multitudes. This is the crowd and their curiosity. Great multitudes. Now, how many is a great multitude? Well, it's probably more than a couple hundred because it's a multitude and it's a mega multitude. It's a great multitude.

A lot of people. And Jesus is right in the midst of the apex of his ministry career. And scores of people are following Christ. And if you want to make an impact in society, the more people you have following you and the more people you have committed to what you're about, the greater your impact's going to be. Christ looks at the crowd. He will turn to the crowd. He will speak to the crowd. But the crowd, this crowd, is very c. As to what's going to happen next, because you see, they were along for what would benefit them.

They wanted to follow Jesus because following Jesus was to their benefit. I mean, He had healed multitudes of people. Those who were sick were healed. Those who were blind could see. Those who were deaf could now hear. And the list goes on and on and on. So, a great multitude were following Christ. And this crowd and their curiosity. Had two major problems. One was a misinterpretation of Scripture, and the other was a misconception of the Savior. Two things. Because they would misinterpret the scripture, they would have a misconception of who Jesus Christ really, truly was.

You understand that because way back in Mark chapter 8, when Christ would proclaim for the very first time to his men the fact that he would die and rise again, and Peter would rebuke him.

He would tell them the essence of his mission. And the disciples wanted nothing to do with that. And in Mark chapter 9, when he spoke about it again, it says that they didn't understand and that they were astonished and fearful. Because they didn't get what the Old Testament said about the coming Messiah who would die for the sins of the world. Most people missed that, and they did. If you've been with us in our study of the cross, you know that we have gone back to the Old Testament to look at those passages.

But because of their misinterpretation of the scripture, they had a misconception of the Savior. You see, he had a mission to seek and to save that which was lost. He had a drive, he had a passion. And they forgot. Remember back in John chapter 6, when he had fed the 5,000, they were so taken by Jesus that they wanted him to be their king. So the text says that they went after him to take him by force to make him the king. I mean, if this guy can feed all these people with just a few fishes and a few loaves of bread, this has got to be our king.

He's got to lead the revolt against Rome. He's got to be the man. He's got to be the political leader that we need to take us from Where we are today to where we can be tomorrow. That's how they perceived Jesus the Messiah. The crowd and their curiosity tells us about Christ and his concern. That's point number two.

Christ. His concern, the text tells us, and he turned and said to them. He turned and said to them Now, what he says to them Is unbelievable. But he has to say it because it's the truth. And Jesus, because he embodies truth, speaks truth. And so he turns to them. Why? Because he is concerned about two things. Number one, their eter destiny.

And number two, their final decision. He is concerned about their eternal destiny. He is concerned about where they're going to end up in the future. He's concerned about. Them having a reality check. Because he came to seek and to save that which is lost. Luke tells us in Luke 19:10, that was his mission. That's what he was about. He was all about. Their future. But with their eternal destiny, became their final decision. And he wanted to make sure that they made the right decision. He wanted to make sure that they had all the information they needed to make a proper decision about following him.

Are you sure this is what you want to do? You see, we don't ask people that because we just want someone to say yes to Jesus. It's always good to ask him: Are you sure you want to give your life to Christ? Are you sure this is what you want to do? Are you sure you want to be a disciple of His? Are you sure you want to follow Christ? Are Really? We don't ask that question because we want to get them to make a decision for Christ. But our Lord, our Lord knows what following him entails. He knows. He wants the crowd to know.

He wants them to understand. Oh, he's glad that they're there. He's glad that they came to follow him. He's glad that they're there to listen to him. But he wants to make sure they understand what exactly they're getting themselves into. Because you see, if you don't understand at the outset what you're getting yourself into, then you really don't understand what Christianity is all about. And we need to tell people what Christianity is all about. What it means to follow Christ. You see, Jesus was about le people to Himself.

And that would require them to be followers of Him. Throughout the Bible, 13 times it says in the New Testament that Christ would call men to follow Him. Follow me. Follow me. That was Christ's evangelistic call. Follow me, and I will make you into something. But you follow me. Peter understood that, James, Andrew. Matthew, John, they understood, follow me. And throughout the Gospels, you have people who have decided to follow Jesus Christ. We see the song, I have dec to follow Jesus. You know, that's an evangelistic song.

It's about following Jesus Christ our Lord. That's what being a disciple is all about. You see, discipleship is not a second step after Christianity.

Discipleship is Christianity. You can't distinguish between the two. To be a disciple is to be a follower, is to be a learner. That's what mathe tes means. It means to learn. And you learn by following. And Christ beckoned men to follow him. He called men to come after him. Follow me, and I will make you into something. You can't even begin to imagine. And so he would call men to follow him. That would be his call. And that call was the call of discipleship to serve him, to honor him. He wasn't talking about another step of commitment.

This is the commitment. It's following Christ. In fact, we said on Wednesday night, if you go through the book of Acts, you realize that the disciples weren't even called Christians to Antioch. That's Acts 11. All the Christians were called disciples. They were all followers of Christ. They were all learners of Christ. And so here is our Lord and Savior, Jesus, beckoning men to follow him. He sees the crowd. He understands their curiosity. He knows that they have misinterpreted the text. He knows.

He knows that they had a misconception of the coming of the Messiah. He knows that. So, because of his great concern for them, he tells them the truth. He tells them the truth. He wasn't about gaining big crowds. In fact, for all practical purposes, Jesus would be a failure in 21st-century Christianity. Because not very many people follow Jesus. But it comes right down to it at the end of his ministry. There were very few people ever committed to Christ. So, by our standards of success today, we'd say, wow, he didn't have a very big church, did he?

Must not have been a very good preacher. He must not have been able to do very many things for his people because nobody followed him, or very few did. But Jesus was about speaking the truth. He wanted people to understand the gospel. So, from the crowd and their curiosity. To Christ and his concern, to the call and its cost. The call and its cost. He's going to give the invitation to the cross. Very clearly, very loudly, that all would understand. Listen to what he says. If any. Anyone, any, any of you, 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. He cannot be a learner of me. He cannot be a follower of mine. That's the very first thing he says to a whole bunch of people.

Could you imagine somebody going on TV and saying that today? How would that go over? Not very well at all. He wouldn't have a TV time sl. If he said that, think about that for a moment. If he said those things, he wouldn have a TV time sl. Because who's going to tune into that? Hate my father, hate my mother, hate my brother, hate my sister? Who wants to do that? Oh, but you need to understand something. He says, here's the call. Number one, you've got to be willing to serve only me.

Me. I'm the priority here. If you're going to be a follower of me, you have got to be committed to me. So, if you're going to come after me, understand this: you have to understand. Hatred for father, mother, wife, children, brother, sister, yes, even your own life. Now listen, people have a hard time with this. But it's not that difficult to understand. The key phrase is: yea, even your own life. Think about that. You say, well, if I'm going to follow Christ and I got to hate my mother, how can that be?

When Jesus said, honor your mother and father, right? If I'm going to be a follower of Christ and learn to hate my wife, and yet the Apostle Paul said, through the inspiration of Scripture, husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church. How do I reconcile those two together? How can I hate and get honor? How can I hate and get love? How do I do that? How does that happen? Very simple this. Simply this. It's that you are so comm to Christ. That every relationship you have pales in comparison to that one primary relationship.

You are so committed to Christ that people think you're uncommitted to everybody else because you are so into Jesus Christ. You love him so much. He wants your undivided loyalty. He wants your undivided commitment. He doesn't want your commitments to be divided. So he says, you even have got to hate your own life. God said to the prophet Ezekiel. Chapter 20 says, You will know that I am the Lord when you loathe your. In our society, we are into loving ourselves. In God's economy, you need to loathe yourself.

So it's very difficult for people today to understand the call to Christianity and the cost involved, but everybody in the world is telling them: you've got to love yourself. And God's saying, no, you've got to loathe yourself. You got to love me, he says. It's not about loving you, it's about loving me. It's about giving your life to me. It's about serving me. You must be willing to serve me no matter what. You've got to be willing to serve me. No matter what your wife says, no matter what your husband says, you got to be so committed to me that you're going to follow my word and everything I say, no matter what it costs you.

That's what Christianity is.