Starting in Luke 14: 25 Jesus gives, us teaching on what a disciple really is. Jesus uses the same words: ‘sit down first’ in describing the man who built a tower and the man who deliberates for war. In effect what Jesus is saying is that “When you are considering the idea of becoming a disciple of mine, pull up a chair and have a seat.” And from this seated position, Jesus is saying, “Let’s talk about what discipleship means for your life. Let’s talk about what it means to count the cost.”

• Real disciples have engaged the ‘math’ issue of following Jesus.
• Disciples have learned to count.

Luke 14:25–33 (KJV)
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.

• Jesus gives back to back parables here.
• He double emphasizes this last point which means that this should pop out to you also.
• Jesus is saying, “I am not only going to tell you this once, I am going to tell it to you twice because I really want you to get this. So take note, pay attention, this is important.”
• So, let’s look at these parables and see what we can learn about ‘doing the math’.
• Notice the following words in these parables.
• First notice that the words ‘sit down first’ appear in both parables.
• Second notice the words ‘count the cost’ in the 1st parable and the word ‘deliberate’ in the 2nd parable.

A Hypothetically Discussion with Jesus on the Topic of Discipleship

• Here is Jesus sitting in His chair and you are sitting across from Him in your chair. He begins to bring up examples of some of His other disciples commitment to Him.
• He brings up John G. Lake’s commitment and says to you ‘Now, Look at this’…

John G. Lake and Discipleship

Satan attacks Lake’s work in Africa.
Lake and his churches had one hundred and twenty-five men out on the field at one time. They were a very young institution, not well known in the world.
One day, certain men in England and America began rumors about Lake. Finances got so low under the awful attack, as people withdrew their support, that they soon could not even mail $10 a month to the workers. Then it got so bad he could not even send them $2. Lake did not want to take the responsibility of having men and their families on the frontier under such conditions. Staff at headquarters sold their clothes, jewelry, pieces of furniture, and in one case their house to bring those one hundred and twenty-five workers off the field for a conference. One night in the progress of the conference, Lake was invited by a committee to leave the room for a minute or two. The conference wanted to have a word by themselves. He stepped out to a restaurant for a cup of coffee and returned soon after.

When John came back in, he found the chairs arranged in an oval, with a little table at the end, and on the table was the bread and wine. Old Father Van der Wall, speaking for the company, said, “Brother Lake, during your absence, we have come to a conclusion; we have made our decision. We want you to serve the Lord’s Supper. We are going back to our fields. We are going back if we have to walk back. We are going back if we have to starve. We are going back if our wives die. We are going back if our children die. We are going back if we die ourselves. We have but one request. If we die, we want you to come and bury us.”
The next year he buried twelve men, sixteen wives and children. Lake sadly recounted, “There was not one of them, if they had had a few of the things a white man needs to eat, but what they might have lived …. That is the kind of consecration (this is the kind of discipleship) that established Pentecost in South Africa. …”

• Now from your seated position, Jesus asks you this question, “Do you still want to be my disciple?”
• Do you still want in?
• ‘Sit down first’ means that some thought should go in on the front side of the question ‘Do you want to be my disciple?’
• The decision to become a follower of Jesus must be made carefully and thoughtfully.
• How different this is than the evangelism that we see here in the western part of the world?
• We preach a message.
• We give an altar call.
• We pray the sinner’s prayer with those that respond.
• We give people a ‘get out of hell free’ card and encourage them to get plugged into church.
• We think that is it; we now fit church services into our weekly routine.
• And don’t cuss, smoke, drink, or kick the cat.
• We think that is the substance of this Christian life.
• Discipleship is way more than that as we have already discussed.
• It requires an informed decision not an inflamed decision.
• An informed decision not an emotional decision.
• A decision made by deliberation.
• A decision made by confronting the question ‘just what exactly is this going to cost me?’ AND being okay with the answer!
• Those 125 missionaries did exactly what Jesus said here in this parable in their conference. They sat down and did the math; they counted the cost. They were okay with the result.
• What was the result of this level of discipleship?
• Was it in vain?
• In five years’ time (1912) in South Africa, they went from no one to 1250 preachers, 625 churches, 100,000 converts.
• From that seated position, Jesus continues and introduces you to Adonriam Judson, missionary to Burma.

Adoniram Judson and Discipleship

• Adoniram Judson was the first Baptist foreign missionary appointed by a missionary society in the United States.
• Adoniram Judson sweated out Burma’s heat for 18 years without a furlough. He arrived in Burma with his wife in July of 1813. He did not baptize his first covert until June of 1819 – six years without a person being saved. He endured torture; He endured imprisonment. He admitted that he never saw a ship sail without wanting to jump on board and go home. When his wife’s health broke and he put her on a home bound vessel in the knowledge he would not see her for two full years, he confided to his diary: “If we could find some quiet resting place on earth where we could spend the rest of our days in peace. . .” But he steadied himself with this remarkable postscript: “Life is short. Millions of Burmese are perishing. I am almost the only person on earth who has attained their language to communicate salvation. . .”
• If you are married, what do you think about this level of commitment?
• Here is a person who stayed behind to win souls for Jesus knowing that he wouldn’t see his wife for two full years!
• Now from your seated position, Jesus asks you this question, “Do you still want to be my disciple?”
• What are we doing here?
• We are ‘counting the cost!’
• We are deliberating.
• We are bouncing these stories off of our heart.
• You can make your commitments to God in the privacy of your prayer closet.
• You must count the cost.
• What is it going to cost me to commit to being a disciple?
• Mark it down you want to count the cost.
• Why?
• A religion that costs nothing is not worth nothing; it is not worth committing to.
• Here is a thought for you to consider.
• Instead of making it so easy to join a church maybe we should make it harder!

ILLUSTRATION: Christians and Hardship
In Russia, Christians are tested by hardship, but in America you are tested by freedom. And testing by freedom is much harder.  “Nobody pressures you about your religion. So you relax and are not so concentrated on Christ, on His teaching, how He wants you to live.” ¹

• Being tested by freedom is harder because you have a choice. When you are tested by hardship, there is no choice.

Galatians 5:13 (ESV)
13 For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

• Jesus tells you to look at the cost involved in following Him.
• Before you follow Him, make an informed assessment as to what is the cost.
• This verse in Galatians 5:13 is a bit different than this verse in Revelation.

Rev. 3:15-16 (NKJV)
15 “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. 16 So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.

• Lukewarm is not the picture Jesus is showing you as you’re seated with Him.
• Note the person that drifts along uncommitted is the person Jesus says will be rejected.
• Following Jesus demands high personal cost.
• Isn’t marriage supposed to be that way?
• Doesn’t marriage demand high personal cost?
• Do the words “Until death do us part” mean anything anymore?
• Marriage is “not to be entered into unadvisedly, but reverently, discreetly, and in the fear of God.”
• Discipleship is to be entered into the same way.
• Serving God demands high personal cost.

ILLUSTRATION: How will the church be lighted?
Several centuries ago in a mountain village in Europe, a wealthy nobleman wondered what legacy he should leave to his townspeople.  He made a good decision. He decided to build them a church.  No one was permitted to see the plans or the inside of the church until it was finished.  At its grand opening, the people gathered and marveled at the beauty of the new church. Everything had been thought of and included.  It was a masterpiece. But then someone said, “Wait a minute! Where are the lamps?  It is really quite dark in here.  How will the church be lighted?”  The nobleman pointed to some brackets in the walls, and then he gave each family a lamp, which they were to bring with them each time they came to worship. “Each time you are here'” the nobleman said, “the place where you are seated will be lit.  Each time you are not here, that place will be dark.  This is to remind you that whenever you fail to come to church, some part of God’s house will be dark.” ²

• That’s a poignant story, isn’t it?  And it makes a very significant point about the importance of our commitment and loyalty to the church.

The poet Edward Everett Hale put it like this:
I am only one,
but still I am one.
I cannot do everything,
But still I can do something;
And because I cannot do everything
I will not refuse to do the something I can do.

• Here is another question for you.
• What if every member of your church supported the church just as you do? What kind of church would you have?
• What if every Christian was like you in your current level of discipleship. What kind of body would Jesus have in the earth?
• What if every single member served God the way you are serving Him?
• What if they gave in the offering like your giving in the offering?
• What if they read their Bible and prayed like you do, what kind of church would it be?
• What if every believer attended the church, loved the church, shared the church, and gave to the church exactly as you do?  What kind of church would you have?
• And Jesus is sitting  there waiting for you to think this through.
• And while He is sitting there with you He brings up…

John Hus and Discipleship

• The Bohemian reformer John Hus was a man who believed the Scriptures to be the infallible and supreme authority in all matters. He was excommunicated by the Church at Rome because he believed that Jesus was the head of the church not the pope.  A Council was called at Constance in Germany in 1414 to discuss reform of the church. Hus was invited to attend and given a promise by Emperor Sigismund that he would have completely safe passage. But a few weeks after he arrived in Constance he was arrested by soldiers and put in prison. It was regarded as justifiable to break a promise given to a heretic. The cell was next to the sewer system and Hus became violently ill. He was then transferred to a cage and was kept in dreadful conditions for about two months. ³
• He died at the stake for that belief in Constance, Germany, on his forty-second birthday. As he refused a final plea to renounce his faith, Hus’s last words were, “What I taught with my lips, I seal with my blood.”
• One last time from your seated position, Jesus asks you this question, “Do you still want to be my disciple?” “Are you willing to believe what you say you believe about My Word as strong as John Hus did?”
• And it finally dawns on you as you are sitting there with Jesus that…
• Grace is free but it is not cheap.
• You finally realize that…
• Salvation is free but discipleship will cost you everything.
• We have to do the math.
• Your heart wants to do the math.
• Your heart wants to count the cost.
• Your heart wants to pay the price.
• This appeals to your spirit man.
• Your heart hungers to be a completely sold-out disciple.
• Check on the inside. It is there.
• Check in your spirit and you know that a hunger is inside of you.
• A deep desire is within you to be God’s favorite child completely wrapped up in Him.

ILLUSTRATION: What is Consecration?
One woman asked a minister, “Will you please tell me in a word, what your idea of consecration is?”
Holding out a blank sheet of paper the pastor replied, “It is to sign your name at the bottom of this blank sheet, and to let God fill it in as He will.” ⁴

• The people that go to the head of the class are those who day in, day out, day in day out pay the price by allowing God to fill-in their sheet.
• This is counting the cost; signing off on a blank sheet of paper and saying to Him ‘God my life is yours, fill in the blank according to your purpose.

The First Parable and Finishing

• The first parable is the building parable and deals with the idea of finishing.
• Hear Jesus on this…

Luke 14:28 (ESV)
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.’

• Did you notice the words ‘not able to finish?’
• It is never about what you did yesterday.
• It is not about how you sacrificed yesterday.
• It is not even about how you failed yesterday.
• It is about what are you doing right now?
• What are you doing today?
• God’s call to Adam in the garden was ‘Adam, where are you; right now?’
• This story that Jesus tells of this tower that was not finished actually happened!
• Jesus is using a live similar situation here.
• Several years earlier (A.D. 27) a poorly built amphitheater had collapsed, with an estimated fifty thousand casualties. The failings of inadequate or half-finished structures were well-known. The crucial point here, however, is the builder’s shame in a society obsessed with honor. ⁵
• New Testament times was an honor and shame based society. Honor was a big big thing to people in the first century. You never wanted to bring dishonor upon yourself or your family.
• There was a great dishonor associated with the failings of this amphitheater. Great dishonor!
• What Jesus is pointing to here is that there is a dishonor associated with starting but not finishing
• Bro. Kenneth Hagin said these words, they are ever on my mind.

It takes the same consecration at 70 years of age as it did when I was 20. — Kenneth E. Hagin

• It is not how you start.
• It’s how you finish.

The Second Parable and Enduring

• The second parable is the war parable and deals with the idea of handle of enduring when the deck is stacked against you.

Luke 14:31 (KJV)
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?

• What are you going to do when things get difficult?
• What are you going to do when things get hard?
• This actually happened!
• This war story that Jesus tells actually happened!
• Again, He is using a live similar situation here.
• Herod Antipas had recently lost a war with a neighboring Roman vassal, so the image of foolhardy war should be meaningful to Jesus’ hearers. ⁶
• What are you going to do when the deck is stacked against you?
• Are you going to find a way to make it through?
• Are you going to fold like a cheap deck of cards?

Luke 21:16–19 (ESV)
16 You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you they will put to death. 17 You will be hated by all for my name’s sake. 18 But not a hair of your head will perish. 19 By your endurance you will gain your lives.

• Jesus says to you as He gets up from His chair, “If you don’t settle these three areas; family, the cross, and the cost, you cannot be my disciple.”

Call to Action:

There is nothing like the peace that comes with fulness of dedication to the gospel of Jesus Christ. The standard is high. Why not decide today to sell out totally, to commit deeply and to live your beliefs in Jesus radically? What is holding you back from this or rather what are you holding on to in its place?

Question: In what ways have you counted the cost of becoming a follower of Jesus? What did you lay aside for the sake of the gospel? If you would please share that in the comments section below.

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