Are you a follower of Jesus? Come on.
Are you a follower of Jesus? Now how do you define that
you're a follower of Jesus? Are you a follower because
you're saying that you asked Jesus into your heart to save
you so that when you die, you go to heaven and that's why you're
a follower? Or have you searched the
scripture out to determine what a follower of Jesus looks like?
That's very important because again, you know, we are in a
society and more and more it's becoming this, which is why we
have to be diligent. The Bible tells us to study, to
show ourselves approved unto God.
A Workman, right? A Workman that rightly devise a
word of truth, who is not ashamed.
Why would they not be ashamed? Because they're rightly dividing
the word of truth. Now, you're not going to be able
to rightly divide the word of truth if you're #1 not studying
and #2 if you even go go across it in a casual manner.
It requires us to be diligent. There has to be a layer of
diligence to it. Amen.
And the good news is, is that as you do it, God is not
withholding from you. He is sharing with you.
He wants to reveal things to you, Amen.
And He wants to reveal things to you through your private time
with Him, but also when you come to church, because this is the
place where equipping begins to take shape.
For God gave gifts unto men, and some he gave as apostles,
prophets, pastor, teachers, and evangelists. 2 or for the
equipment of the Saints. So you should come to service
with this expectation. I'm going to be equipped more
and equipping is discovering some things that you may not
have known before, or it's sharpening the skills that you
already have. Let me give you an example.
If you are firing a weapon and you only go to the range once a
year, do you understand your skill is not going to be as well
as someone who is doing it on a repetitively?
Now, I have a pastor friend of mine who said, listen, you know,
you'll do yourself a good service is if you will practice
at home more than you go to the range because what you're doing
at home will reciprocate at the range.
And so this person had gotten into some competitions where,
you know, you would go through a series of things that you had to
fire your weapon at certain targets.
You know, some would be a little girl and you don't want to fire
the target at her, but you do want to fire the target at the
bandit. And the things are popping up so
fast, you're having to make decisions real quick, OK.
And so as a result of that, in order for that individual to get
good, the first thing they did is they stood in front of their
mirror and took their sidearm and just pulled it out.
They got really good at getting it out and they could pull their
weapon and fire it in less than a second, but not only fire it
less than a second, but fire it accurately.
Because when you pull the trigger, you can pull the gun,
the weapon, you can pull that thing so that it goes either to
the right or to the left. You can put pressure on that
thing. And there's a whole thing that
you have to develop what they call muscle memory, but that
only comes through repetition. You know, the same thing is true
with the Word of God. If you do not continue to
meditate on the Word, it will not become a spiritual muscle
memory. And so then someone could say
something like, I've never heard that, but you can accept it
because you've not taken the time to go through some muscle
memory and say, wait a minute, that's not even right.
Oh, I got some questions about that.
Before I eat that, let me ask a couple of questions, right?
And so you know what, we all want everyone to hear the word,
be doers of the word. But in order for that to take
place, we actually have to examine what it means because in
our society today, this, you know, information is coming at
such a fast rate and it's partial information on top of
that. And it's really just enough
information to affect your emotions.
Most information that you're seeing, whether on news, social
media outlets and sometimes even in pulpits is that it can be
enough information to pull you in an emotional area to support
a thought you already have without you ever investigating
is at actually so Amen. And so we it behooves us to find
ourselves as we taught last week as disciples to actually be a
student of the word again. I'm I do not want you to come to
Anchor Bay Church and be lectured to.
This is not lecture session. This is impartation by the
Spirit that if you search it for yourself, it will literally
change your life. It will govern how you think,
say, do, and another voice you actually won't follow.
Because when we when Jesus says follow me, that means no other
voice, no voice contrary to it is written.
So what does the Bible say about following him?
Look at Matthew chapter 1828, excuse me, Matthew 28 verses 18
to 20. It says this.
And Jesus came up and spoke to them saying all authority.
How much authority has been given to me in heaven?
And so where does he have authority in heaven and and how
much of it OK, go therefore and make what disciples of all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and the
Holy Spirit. We will do baptism today.
Hallelujah. Teaching them to observe all how
much that I commanded you and lo, I am with you even to the
end of the age. So right here, this passage of
Scriptures let us know that God's relationship with man of
the church that he's building comes through a process of
discipleship, not conversion alone.
However, can being converted is necessary in order for you to be
a disciple. It's called the first step.
Now when I say the first step, it is not take a step and stop.
When we say first step is that you recognize that Jesus Christ
died and rose for all your wrongdoing and you want him to
be Lord of your life. He wants you to come into his
Kingdom. So it when he says this is how
you come through me, through my death, burial and resurrection.
When you call on the name of Jesus to be saved, that is just
the first step into a natural next step.
It was never this, you know, get get to the cross, step through
the cross and stop. That was never his.
And then now you're in a holding pattern until you go to heaven
when you die. No, the Lord was like, come on
in. I mean, really, when you're
invited into a house, how many? You step through the threshold
and then stop, right? How many we how many of us do
that? Well, come on, let's have
dinner. OK.
You show up at the house and how many?
You take the first step in and then stop.
Well, I'm in the house. Well, you're in the house.
Well, dinner's over here. We're going to serve it at the
table. Well, you can bring it to me,
Right? Bring it to me.
Come to me. I'm not leaving here.
Well, if you don't leave here, you don't get to enjoy the
benefits of the whole house. So God never intended for you to
step inside the door one step and stop.
He expected that when you said man, you're Lord, that was first
step, acknowledging your Lord. Second step is I'm going on
through and talking with you and we're going to carry this thing
out. Why?
Because now I'm going to learn who I am now in Christ.
OK, so you know, I have some people in my life that examine
the Word, study the Word, you know, go through the word.
And I have this one person as you know him, Rick Hutchinson,
that's over in the Dominican Republic.
And we were having some conversations about this and he
was doing a particular study and sent it to me.
And this came back and I thought, this is so good that I
want to read this to to you this morning.
It says so true. Conversion is a sovereign spirit
initiated act of God in which a person is born from above,
granted repentance and faith. They are transferred from the
domain of darkness into union with Christ, incorporated into
the covenant community, and made participants in New Christ, new
creation life. It is so much more than praying
a prayer, walking an owl, or signing a card.
So much more. Conversion is a reality that can
only be done by God because no man comes to God.
No not one. It is a God initiated
relationship. While we were yet sinners,
Christ died for us. But it's God calling you, saying
you are more than what you're living now.
My destiny for you is bigger than what you're experiencing,
and what you're living now is punishable by eternal
separation. I don't want you eternally
separated. I want you back in the family.
In order to do that, though, you're going to have to be a
different person now. You can't change yourself.
Only I can do that. So I've taken on all your
wrongdoing so you can take on me.
And if you'll call me Lord, then I'll put in you a new spirit
that's alive to God. And now that that spirit's alive
to God, my, my spirit, the Holy Spirit will come and live in
you. Bear witness with your spirit,
you're a child of God. And then begin to instruct you
in discipleship because there is a way that you flow and live
outside in this new life. So what is a disciple?
Jesus said? He said go in all the world and
make disciples. He did not say go in the world
and make converts. Was never God's intent for
people to pray a prayer. Leave them alone and go on.
God wants them to be incorporated within His church
where they can grow up spiritually.
OK, so disciple by definition means to follow his precepts and
instructions. Enroll as a scholar.
It comes from another Greek word that means a learner, a pupil,
which comes from another Greek word, the foundation, which
means to learn by practice or experience, acquire a custom or
habit. Let me say it this way.
As you know, Rick and I were having some conversation.
This came up and I said this is powerful.
This is why so many believers struggle.
They are trying to obey into identity rather than obey from
identity. Obviously, before Christ we're
trying to be right with God. Well, that's works of the flesh.
You are trying to work out salvation yourself, independent
from God. But when you call on the name of
Jesus, you become a new creature in Christ, and from that you
obey. It's out of your new
identification that you walk in obedience, not because you're
earning something from God, but because He's made you someone.
And this new spirit loves to obey God.
We have said this for years. This new spirit in you loves to
obey God because your old spirit could not.
And even when through your soul realm and your physical body,
you tried to do things right, but you found out, man, my heart
was wrong and everything I'm doing.
God changed your heart, meaning he changed your spirit.
The spirit that was rebellious, dead was not in union with God.
He gave you a new one. And now out of that, that spirit
says I love to obey. I want to obey.
Obeying is not an issue and it's not performance.
It's just my nature. See, we use these terms and
these terms are being thrown around in the church.
You know, performance and all this.
Well, when you know who you are, you're not performing anymore.
You're just obeying. This is what you do.
I'm not trying to impress you with my obedience to God.
I just love to obey God. But my obedience does
demonstrate it does have fruit. It does showcase God's, the
lifestyle of God. That's just what it does and I'm
thankful for that. So again, we saw that Jesus is
the only one who can define what a disciple looks like.
We can't determine that He does it because he's the one.
He said go make disciples. Well, how can you make a
disciple if he hasn't qualified what 1 looks like?
And again, we can say all kinds of stuff in the church.
Saints can say all kinds of things and they can actually be
socially acceptable that a majority of people can hold that
opinion. I mean, I held opinions with a
lot of Saints when I was still living fleshly.
I did. But then I continued to grow and
I quit holding those opinions because I realized my opinion
doesn't matter, that I really need to do it his way.
And what I thought was OK is really not OK and I don't have
to because I'm not even that person anymore and I'm
different. And why am I making excuse to be
To live away, act away, respond away and throw out, well you
know if I die I'm going to go to heaven anyway.
When yet it's really the Spirit of God saying you're much more
than what you're doing right now and you can do it.
And I'm like, you know what, I'm going to do it.
I'm just going to obey you because I can because I want to,
because it's my nature and I'm going to live that lifestyle.
It's going to be seen. Praise the Lord.
So Jesus said in Luke chapter 14 verse 25 to 27, he says now
large crowd, crowds were going around along with him and he
turned and said to them. Now he says to the mass, if
anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother
and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, even
your own life, he cannot be my disciple.
Now who said this? Now that's heavy hitting.
Could you imagine if if if pulpits all over the world were
saying that Now obviously is God saying that you are too abandon
all those relationships. He's obviously not saying that.
What he's saying is is if if the your relationship with your
father, your relationship with your mother, your relationship
with your wife, your relationship with your children,
your relationship with your brothers and sister.
We're talking about natural or married, which marriage
relationship is like Christ in the church.
There's a type and shadow there. He said if all those
relationships in comparison to me doesn't look like it looks
like you don't even care about them, then you're not my
disciple. Because he's not saying husbands
don't love your wives. He's not saying that.
He's not saying don't honor your mother and your father.
He's not saying don't treat your children, don't exasperate your
children. He's not saying your brother and
sister don't even think about them.
What he's saying is, is I am the number one relationship you have
and all the others are to yield to that relationship.
And if you put any of those relationships first, then you're
not. You can't be my disciple.
If any of those relationships can keep you away from me and
obeying me and doing what I'm asking, then you're allowing
those relationships to be before.
And you're not my disciple. Because when you actually follow
Jesus, then he'll make your relationship with your father,
mother the best it can be. You'll make your relationship
with your wife as best as it can because again, your father is
not you and your father may still not like you even though
you're loving them. Same thing with your Mama, same
thing with your wife or your spouse.
And that could go the other way, a wife to a husband.
You know you can do everything right and your kids still reject
you because Adam rejected God and God's the perfect father
who's never sinned but had a rebellious son.
You hear what I'm saying? What he's saying is do never let
these relationships come first and do not invest in them more
then your relationship with me, 'cause out of that relationship
with me you make these relationships the best possible.
But then he goes on in verse 27 it says whoever does not carry
his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.
Now again, I'm not saying this, Jesus is saying this.
I'm putting no pressure on you in God's Kingdom to date, you
can do anything you want to do, but He's going to hold you
responsible to whatever you do. God is not forcing your will,
but he is telling you, yield your will to mine, because my
will is life. It's love, it's abundance, it's
blessing, it's peace, it's joy, it's righteousness, it's
justice. It's amazing, right?
And so I yield to him and then he says, listen, if you're not
willing to do the assignment I've asked, I've ordained for
you while you're in the earth, which tells us then if Jesus
said go into all the world and make disciples, then just having
a person prayed the prayer of salvation, but never discover
why they were born was never God's intent.
And as you know, Doctor Miles Monroe said, you know, when a
person don't know why they were born, abuses are inevitable, are
inevitable. And many of you have lived
abusive lives. You've abused yourself due to
your lack of knowledge. You were in relationships you
never should have been in. They were toxic.
They were completely ungodly. They left you in great.
Emotional distress, you put stuff in your body to try to
numb the pain that only began to eat your body.
I mean, we could go time, we could talk all kinds of stuff
that we did. It's because we didn't know our
why the man when you know your why, I said when you know your
why. And again, if Jesus says whoever
does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my
disciple, then that means God will tell you what why you're
here. He will and listen, the only
thing is not your family. Family is 1.
If you're a parent, it's definitely to help raise your
children, but it's not the only thing.
It's not the only thing and it's awesome and you're going to do
your part. But you know, God always extends
us beyond our natural because our family is actually bigger
than our natural. Remember what Jesus said when
they came and said, hey, your mom, your brother and sister
want to talk to you? He said, who is my Mama now?
Jesus is a very intelligent guy. He's anointed of God.
Has he suffered from amnesia? No, he hasn't.
He says those who do the will of my father, these are my mother,
my brothers, my sister. This family's way bigger than
the ones you are having by procreation, right?
They're important. You want to be an example, but
at the end of the day, life's even bigger than that and your
why is bigger than that. Hallelujah.
So with that being said, Jesus, if we are going to be a
disciple, we understand a disciple then that this last
scripture here says whoever does not carry his own cross and come
after me cannot be my disciple. We could translate this to say
whoever does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my
disciple. Why do I say that?
Turn over to Matthew chapter 4, verse 19.
Matthew chapter 4, verse 19. Jesus, man, this is powerful.
Jesus, the chapter previous has the Holy Spirit come upon him
without measure. The Father has said, this is my
beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased.
That same Spirit leads him into the wilderness to be tempted of
the devil, the one who has authority and power on the earth
that he received from Jesus's brother Adam, the first Adam.
And so he is tempted by that, by him, the one who has literal
authority on the earth, the God of the world.
OK. And so Jesus conquers that
scenario, all right. He has just been tended to by
angels and been refreshed after 40 days of fasting and being
tempted. I mean, he has, he has been
relentlessly attacked and his attack is based upon his
identity. If you are, if you are trying,
he wants him to doubt who he is. So when Jesus responds, he was
not responding trying to prove he was someone.
He was responding because he already was this.
That's why the Father said you are my son.
So Jesus, his response was not to prove to himself he was a
son, God's son. It was out of the fact he is
God's son and ours is the same way.
Our life of faith is not in response to prove to everyone
I'm right with God, I'm doing it because I'm already right with
God. Hallelujah.
OK, in essence, Jesus saying this is your problem, not my
problem. I know who I am.
You apparently don't know who I am or you don't believe I am who
I am. But you going to find out I am
who I am. And you're going to find out
when my foot is on, when my heel is is is on your neck, when I'm,
when I am stripping you of all the authority you're currently
holding on to because I'm going to get it.
I'm going to get it all back and then I'm going to await that day
because it's coming that we going to cast you into the lake
of fire and you'll never come out of that prison ever again.
Hallelujah. Come on.
That way I get a better shout than that.
Your enemy has been defeated. He is of no issue to you.
Hallelujah. So Jesus now is about to go
preach his Gospel, but before he does, he's picking up some
disciples and it says, and he said to them, follow me and I'll
make you fishers of men. All right, couple of things we
need to see here before we move into something that I came
across that I that is absolutely powerful.
You cannot fish for men if you're not following him.
And it doesn't say follow me for a little bit and then you could
do it without me. If you follow me, this can
occur. But it you have to follow me for
this to occur. You have to follow me for this
record and this term. Follow me literally means
because it comes from 2 Greek words.
It literally means come here after me.
So he said come here after me. That's what he's saying to them.
Come here after me. I'm going to show you another
passive scripture where he uses the term follow, but it's a
different Greek word. Here he is looking at some
fishermen. This is what they do
professionally their whole life up to this point.
And he says, follow me, come here after me.
And what did they do? They left everything in this
moment, four people join Jesus and from there he goes and says
because he's priest, you know, 417 repent for the Kingdom of
heaven is at hand, right. So I came across this that a
scholar in his study of Matthew 419 said I'm going to read some
excerpts. It is powerful.
He says this, such was the first exercise of the royal authority
of the new King. Such was the constitution of His
new cabinet, shall we call it, or of His Kingdom itself?
Shall we not rather say, For so far as we see, His Cabinet at
this moment was all the Kingdom that He had?
Let us here pause a moment and try to realize the picture
painted for us in the background.
The lake with the deserted boats upon the shore in the
foreground, the five men walking along, four of them without the
least idea of where they're going or of what they had to do.
And suppose that we were told by some bystander that man of the
five that looks like the leader of the rest, thinks himself a
king. He imagines he has been sent to
set up a Kingdom of heaven upon the earth, and he has just asked
these four to join him, and there they are setting out upon
their task. Where was ever a weaker thing in
this world than the beginning of this Kingdom?
It would be difficult to imagine any commencement that would have
seemed weaker in worldly eyes. Stand by once again and look at
it with only human eyes. Say it is not all weakness
together. Weakness in the leader to
imagine he can set up a Kingdom after such a fashion.
Weakness in the followers to leave a pain business on such a
foolish errand. But the fullness, foolishness of
God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than
men. And now we can look back upon
that scene. We recognize it was one of the
grandest this earth has ever witnessed.
If it were painted now, that light must be must.
What light there must be in the leader's eye, what majesty in
his step, what glory of dawning faith and love and hope in the
faces of the rest. It's just a casual day in
Israel. And the King of glory, the law
prophesied Messiah has just left the enemy, conquered his
temptations, proclaimed his Kingdom is here and begins his
recruitment. And this is the witness account
of that first encounter of where he says, I'm going to assemble
12 to come follow me because this Kingdom is here and it's
never going to exit the planet. You know, so many times because
we've been so enthralled by the saving power of God, we miss the
majesty of his Kingdom. And we are missing these moments
within Scripture that are so telling, so powerful, so
illuminating when you maintain the lens of what the Bible is
about. A king, his Kingdom, and his
royal offspring. I'm so thankful that God saved
me, but I'm thankful that he saved me out of something, into
something so grand, so magnificent, so amazing.
Something that can never be shaken, something that can never
be defeated, something that can never be eradicated.
This Kingdom that has no end. And now I get to participate
solely because I've been made a son and I'm a disciple of it.
I'm going to follow him. I'm going to come here after me.
This is why a Sunday morning should be the number one thing
on your list, that the things of His Church should always be
resonating within you 'cause it is a call to demonstrate His
Kingdom. That not only do you get the
mere privilege of, of, of being this example at your place of
work, but then you get to assemble with other children of
God, hear from heaven, be encouraged, be equipped, be
strengthened. Because we've been given a
Kingdom that cannot be shaken. And that Kingdom reigns today
and it will physically manifest in the planet.
And we're already a part of it. Wow, this is so amazing.
So how do you follow you? First, you must follow Christ.
Secondly, you must submit to His teaching and His influence.
Unlike the 12 the apostles of the Lamb, you can You're not
physically following him because Jesus is not on the planet in
physical form. So how do you follow Jesus
today? In order to be a Fisher of men,
you must follow Him in his teachings.
You must follow Him in His precepts.
You must submit to Him. You must yield to his way of
doing things. And that's how you follow Christ
today. Lord, how would you have me do
it? How do you want me to respond?
What do you want me to do? Is this the job for me or should
I take this one? Where do I go?
What do I do? Who do I connect with?
Who's going to pull out my gift? Who's going to allow me to
become the most fruitful I can be?
Who do I connect with? Where do I need to be?
So that all that you ordained for my life come, because here I
am. Whatever you say that I will
follow. I'll follow.
You can't say you're following and not showing up.
How can you play? Follow the leader?
Because I could get a line right now.
Let's do it. All right?
Come on, Virgin. You and Rufino, y'all come.
I want y'all to come be a part of this.
We're going to get the cameras running now.
Come on, Thaddeus. Come help me out.
Come on, Ricky. Let's get one more.
Casey, come on up. Let me get You got a lot of men
following because we need to. Men need to start following.
We already got enough women doing this.
All right? All right, But we're going to
put virgin first, OK? I'm going to be God for today,
all right? Don't get offended because I
said that. I'm not God.
I'm just pretending, all right? OK, You're going to follow me.
OK? Where are y'all followers?
Come here after me, all right? OK, so we know this particular
scenario, we call it follow the leader as a game, right?
And so obviously wherever I'm going, they're supposed to go,
right? They're supposed to do go.
And the direction where I'm going, what I'm doing, they're
following me. Now for a moment, let me get
across here. So we'll all be stressed out
across the platform. You could say that you're
following me with your eyes, 'cause everywhere I went you
watched. But there's a difference between
you watching following and you actually doing following, right?
This is the big difference because many believers are
spectating their discipleship instead of participating in
discipleship because although you may be watching us with your
eyes, your actions are not. So if I looked and said, you
know, Pastor Mike, you following us, he could rightly say, yeah,
I'm following you. But is he following us like
they're following us? And this is what Jesus meant.
So if I looked at Pastor Mike and I said, hey, come here after
me, follow. Now, how's he going to answer
that? If he stays there and just does
what he's doing now, would you call him a disciple?
But I told him to come here after me.
Here we go. Because he understands what that
actually meant in the church. We're redefining Follow me, as
if, well, I'm following God. I watch people online, you know,
I watch social media, you know, I heard this, that and the
other. And there's no action to their
faith, right? I don't actually have to get up
and attend a church anymore. Man, anybody listening to us
right now, this is good stuff. There is a difference and the
quality of these people's lives are going to be way different
than the quality of those that are sitting in a seat just
watching because they're going to have an experience that
you're not going to have. OK, y'all come on in right here.
Everybody gather around. Come on, come on, gather around
real quick. Come on, everybody gather around
real quick. All right, let me turn my mic
off real fast. Did you see us?
Did you hear what we said? You know why?
Because you can follow without hearing, because you're not in
proximity, because you're not a doer.
So they just got access to stuff that you didn't even know that
you didn't hadn't heard because you're not personally present.
And Jesus, when he said follow me, it meant this and intimacy.
It's going to require effort out of you, not because you're
earning something, but because you're following someone.
You can all be seated. Thank you, Hallelujah.
There you go. Amen.
It's Christ only that can qualify us for the work.
Jesus said follow me and I'll make you fishers of men.
He can only qualify you to be a Fisher of men.
Now let me say it this way. 111 scholar said this, when, when
Jesus said, and I'll make you fishes or men, he was saying
this. You shall gather men into the
Gospel net and gain them over to faith, and such an abundant
success. I will give you that the number
of souls converted or by you shall be greater than that of
the fishes you have been used to catch.
Now in the Luke account of this, which is at the beginning, Jesus
when he comes on this scene to say follow me that we just saw
in Matthew, follow me and I'll make you fishers or men.
Jesus shows up and they have been fishing all night and he
says go, let go, let your Nets back out of which Peter says
I've done this all night. We didn't catch anything but at
your word, OK, Because here's the thing.
Jesus shows up in the Luke account.
People are gathered around Matthew, says Matthew 417,
repent for the Kingdom of heaven as a head.
He says something in verse 18. And then now we hear verse 19.
But Luke gives us the amplified version of that particular
account. Jesus shows up with Peter,
James, John, Andrew hanging out, mending their Nets from working
all night, of which a crowd was following Jesus.
And he said, you know, I'm going to teach them some things.
And so he said, Peter, can I borrow your boat?
I'm going to back out a little bit so that they can.
I can see everybody. And he's like, sure.
And so now he ministers repent for the Kingdom of heaven is at
hand. The king all by himself begins
to deliver the Kingdom message. You got to change your thinking
on how you do life, what you think is success, how you think
you should function, because this Kingdom does not function
on the earth like you think it does.
After he's done with that, he says, Peter, I need you to go
back out and let your net down. And he's like, wait a minute,
I'm clean. We're done.
There was nothing there. But after he heard Jesus preach
on the Kingdom, he's like, at your word.
Because he sense the authority of this man, he's captivated in
his spirit, even though he's not born of God.
He said at your word, he goes out and he less down the net and
man, he starts bringing in so many fish that it is about to
break his Nets and he starts to put them into his boats and his
boats getting so full of fish that it's starting to sag.
And he knows, man, if I put all these in here, we're going to
seek. So he calls his partners.
The other brothers come out here.
They came out, they load up their boat.
Both of them are sagging. They low riding on the water
hoping they can get to shore before they both sink and lose
everything. But they make it of which Peter
said I'm a sinful man and this is where Jesus says come follow
me and I'll make you fishers of men.
You think that catches impressive because here's the
thing, what did these fishermen do with their fish?
They did not play catch and release.
And what we are doing in the church, if we don't watch out as
we're playing catch and release, when our responsibility is not
to catch and release, but to catch, clean, filet, and serve,
that's what we're here to do. Now.
Jesus makes you righteous in spirit.
But the body or the churches to renew your mind, it's to get
your mind cleaned up, your emotions cleaned up, your
behavior cleaned up. And again, you're not, you're
not doing it. You're releasing what you
already are. You're yielding to this
identity. You are, and you're allowing
that identity to come out. And the church helps clean your
soul realm through the Word so that you will become something
that is this awesome fillet put on a plate so the world can
taste and see that the Lord is good.
Because you're giving yourself away.
You've become a disciple so that people can taste the fruit of
your life. It's not catch and release.
Hey, look, we called it. Wow.
We got one save. Great.
Oh, look, we got another one. Great.
And what are we doing? We're throwing them back into
the world, which is the sea. I mean, we can even catch them,
tag them, throw them back. But now they're out in the sea
again. Hallelujah.
Look at John chapter 12 verse 25.
John 2526 says this. He he who loves his own, he who
loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world
will keep it to eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must.
What and where I am there my servant will be also.
If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.
This word follow here is different from the Greek word in
Matthew chapter 4. It means this to be in the same
way with so Jesus says come here after me and as you come here
after me and get the initial call, then he'll have you follow
him so that you are the same way with him.
In essence, how He is, so are you, as the Scripture says, as
He is so are we in the earth, that as disciples we actually
reflect Him. And what does it say that the
disciples should bear the image of the one of of whom they are
following? Look what it says in Matthew
chapter 10 verse 24 and 25. It says a disciples not above
his teacher, nor slave above his master.
It is enough for the disciple that he become like his teacher
and the slave like his master. So it is, should we be like
Jesus? Now Jesus goes on and says this.
If they have called the head of the house bells above, how much
more will they malign the members of his household?
Now what is Jesus saying here? If you're my disciples, you're
going to act like me. But know this, every disciple of
mine, the world will attack. And the reason why I believe
that we've kind of digressed in our theology, we digressed in
our theology is because it's more comfortable to just talk
about the initial conversion. Because when you start talking
discipleship, there's the acknowledgement of a challenge
and we want the least amount of trouble.
So for us, a lot of times we rather accept, well, I'm going
to go to heaven when I die. That's all that matters.
And as a result, even though we know Scripture say you can build
your house on the sand or build your house on the rock.
Now what we do is we assume that because we're born again, we're
on the rock. Yet many Christians are falling
left and right when troubles are coming, storms of life are
happening, You would think, well, it really looks more like
you're on sand than you are on a rock because you're caving in
the pressure. And this should not be, but it
will be if all you are is accepted.
Jesus say you're following him and your discipleship is solely
based on one time prayer, confession, and I know where I'm
going to go when I die. But when you know who you are,
then you realize, OK, if they came against Jesus, I understand
they'll come against me because as he is, so am I in the world.
Not only in repeating what he did.
What did Jesus say? The works that I do, even
greater works. Will you do well?
Did he get persecuted for those words?
Yes, he did. Well, we don't want persecution.
It comes with discipleship. But can I give you some good
news? I said, can I give you some good
news? Look at John chapter 15 verses
18 to 20. Jesus said if the world hates
you, you know that it hated me before it hated you.
If you were of the world, the world would love its own.
But because you are not of the of the world, but I chose you
out of the world because of this the world.
What? So it's OK that you go to work
and people hate you. It's OK that you don't get along
with everybody. Quit sweating it.
The Bible tells you to live at peace with men as far as you
can, but God knows that you're not going to live at peace with
everybody because he already told you.
The world's going to hate you because they hated me first.
If they hate me, guess what? Well, I don't want people to
hate me. I want people to like me.
That's why I have a social media.
This is not about you being liked.
This is about you being godly. Are you hearing me?
It's about you following Jesus. Jesus did not come to be liked.
Jesus came to fulfill the will of his Father.
And for those who love Jesus, this is easy because all we care
about is being known by him. We don't care if the world hates
us and persecutes us. Which will include the
religious. It will include the religious.
He goes on and says in verse 20, remember the word that I said to
you, A slave is not greater than his master.
If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.
Then he goes on and said this. This is good news though.
If they kept my word, they will keep yours also.
So what's he saying? You're going to go and represent
me, Say things that I'm saying. You're not Speaking of your own
opinion, and you're going to have great persecution.
But you know, I said some things to people and they kept it.
Guess what? When you say things to people
that I'm telling you to say, they're going to keep it too.
Not everyone's going to actually hate you, but you can't be moved
or stop because of the ones who do.
Last Scripture is this Hebrews chapter 12 verses one through 3
says it this way. Therefore, since we have so
great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay
aside every incumbents and the sin which so easily entangles
us, and let us run with endurance the race that was set
before us. We are going to take our cross
and follow Him because we are going to be His disciples.
Verse 2. Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the
author and perfector or finisher of our faith, for the joy, who
for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despised the
shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Listen, get this for a moment, Jesus, for the joy is now set
down at the right hand of the Father, for the joy of
accomplishing His Father's will. It has it in given him the right
to sit down at the right hand of the Father, But because of the
joy of following His Father's voice, what he received as his
reward did not happen without the persecution.
The shame that it happened in the middle because he came to a
place that was in rebellion to him, that was separated from
him, to a species of being that were not right with God, that
didn't wanted nothing to do with God.
Yet Christ still kept the course, and he tells us in verse
3. So consider him who endured such
hard hostility by sinners against himself, so that you
will not grow weary or lose heart.
Listen as a disciple. Don't lose heart because
challenges come. People no longer want to be your
friend. They no longer want to hang out
with you because of your righteousness.
You understand the only reason why people don't want to be
around each other a lot of times has to do with the lifestyle
they're living. Because when righteousness is in
play, everybody righteous loves to be with the righteous.
And the righteous can't even engage the unrighteous.
But the unrighteous does not want to hang with the righteous
doesn't want to do it. And the unrighteous hates us not
because they're really hating us, they're hating the life of
God we're living. That's the reality.
So I'll give you this one last scripture.
I think it's John 1638 maybe so y'all can correct me if I'm
wrong or Jesus said in this life you'll have trials and
tribulation. 1633 John 1633 In this life you'll have trials and
tribulations, but but be of good.
What for Jesus said I've overcome the world.
So if you are a disciple of Jesus, you've already overcome
cause disciples actually overcome.
It's worth following him.