Category Archives: discipleship

Be All You Can Be – Psalm 104:1,35

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“Let all that I am praise the Lord.” (Psalm 104:1,35, NLT)

“Be All You Can Be” was the recruiting slogan of the United States Army for over twenty years. The slogan meant that because of your training and experiences in the United States Army you can become a successful, self-actualized individual.  It meant that the Army could start you on the path of  realizing everything that you have wanted or were meant to be in your life and your career.

But the Psalmist had a different take on success and self-actualization. The Psalmist declared that you should devote your whole self to praising God!

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Fuzzy Faith – Acts 18:25-26

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“This man had been instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught the things about Jesus accurately, although he knew only John’s baptism. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue. After Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him home and explained the way of God to him more accurately. (Acts 18:25-26, HCSB)

Apollos was from Alexandria, Egypt, a city of great learning. However, his knowledge of the gospel of Jesus was deficient since he apparently was a disciple of John the Baptist.

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Threading Needles With Camels – Part 3 (Eliminating Competing Priorities) – Matthew 19

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(This is the third in a series of three meditations on the story of the rich young ruler in Matthew 19.)

“Everyone who has left houses, brothers or sisters, father or mother, children, or fields because of my name will receive 100 times more and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last and the last first” (Matthew 19:29-30, HCSB).

Matthew 19:13-30 recounts the familiar story of the rich young ruler and his meeting with Jesus.

After His meeting with the rich young ruler, Jesus explained to His disciples why he advised the man to sell all his possessions. Jesus explained by declaring the well-known and often misinterpreted maxim that it is hard (or impossible) for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, as difficult as trying to thread a needle with a camel (Matthew 19:23; Mark 10:23; Luke 18:24).

The rich young ruler had come to Jesus to ask what good things he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus replied that only by obedience to God’s commandments does one obtain eternal life.

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Threading Needles with Camels – Part 2 (Knowing What’s Really Important) – Matthew 19

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(This is the second in a series of three meditations on the story of the rich young ruler in Matthew 19.)

“When the young man heard that command, he went away grieving, because he had many possessions” (Matthew 19:22, HCSB).

Matthew 19:13-30 relates the familiar story of the encounter of Jesus with a man traditionally identified as a rich young ruler. This passage describes the encounter between Jesus and the rich young ruler. In a debriefing with His disciples after the encounter, Jesus made the well-known camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle analogy, depicting the difficulty confounding rich people entering into God’s Kingdom.

Now, the rich young ruler seemed to be a person who wanted to do the right thing.

He wanted to acknowledge God in his life and be faithful to Him so he could make it into heaven.

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Threading Needles with Camels – Part 1 (When Good Isn’t Good Enough) – Matthew 19

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(This is the first in a series of three meditations on the story of the rich young ruler in Matthew 19.)

“If you want to be perfect, Jesus said to him, go, sell your belongings and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow Me” (Matthew 19:21, HCSB).

Matthew 19:13-30 relates the familiar story of the encounter of Jesus with a young man who is thought to be a person of some standing among the Jews. So, he is traditionally identified as a rich young ruler.

The passage in Matthew 19 first describes the encounter between Jesus and the rich young ruler, followed by a post-encounter discussion between Jesus and His disciples in which Jesus points out the spiritual disadvantages of affluence. His explanation to His disciples is highlighted by the ironic camel-through-the-eye-of-a-needle analogy depicting the difficulty that confounds rich people in making it to heaven.

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It Just Makes Sense to Follow Jesus – Matthew 16:24-25

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“If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it”  (Matthew 16:24-25, NLT).

At first glance, Jesus’s invitation in these verses may seem like a peculiar way of trying to attract a following.

Who wants to be Jesus’s follower if it requires you to give up your own life, to turn from your selfish ways and take up your cross?

It doesn’t really sound very interesting. In fact, it doesn’t sound like much fun at all!

But when you consider the membership requirements to be in His club that Jesus expressed in these verses within the context of the complete passage (vs. 24-28), His invitation to spend your life following Him instead of following after your own self-interests doesn’t seem so unusual.

In fact, it makes a lot of sense! It becomes a most compelling challenge!

Peter had just identified Jesus as the Messiah: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God” (vs. 16). As Messiah He will return to Earth at the end of time to judge all people according to their deeds (vs. 27).

So, there is clearly no eternal advantage to rejecting Jesus, to being selfish or self-absorbed. Instead, you have everything to gain by living for God and making His will the main the priority of your life.

Because in the end, Jesus is going to judge you according to how you lived your life and not on what possessions or power you accumulated for yourself during your lifetime: “And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Is anything worth more than your soul?” (vs. 26).

From the perspective of eternity, it just makes sense to follow Jesus!

“My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me”
(Galatians 2:20, NLT).

Filling Empty Pockets – Matthew 14:19-21

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“Jesus took the five loaves and two fish, looked up toward heaven, and blessed them. Then, breaking the loaves into pieces, he gave the bread to the disciples, who distributed it to the people. They all ate as much as they wanted, and afterward, the disciples picked up twelve baskets of leftovers”  (Matthew 14:19-21, NLT).

We sometimes think the way God provides for His people is to give us what we don’t have or more of what don’t have enough of.

Our pockets are empty and we expect God to fill them.

For example, if we are experiencing financial difficulties, we pray for a miracle to increase our income; if our car is broken down, we pray for a new one.

However, God’s care over our lives is more often provided by extending the resources we already have as they are offered totally and willingly to the Lord than by giving us what we don’t have or more of what we already have.

God’s provision is demonstrated by the miracle of Jesus feeding the five thousand with five loaves of bread and two fish. The feeding of the five thousand is the only miracle of Jesus recorded in all four gospels (cf. Mark 6:32-44; Luke 9:10-17; John 6:1-13) and is recorded with substantial narration in each of the gospels, which may suggest its importance among the supernatural events of Jesus’ ministry.

Undoubtedly, the miracle itself was significant based solely on its scale–feeding an estimated 15-20 thousand men, women, and children from five loaves of bread and two fish and then having 12 baskets of leftovers!

Jesus had been preaching to the large crowd for an extended period of time in a remote location and the people needed to eat. When the disciples indicated the unavailability of food at the location, Jesus suggested how He might intervene: “Bring them here,” he said (vs. 18) referring to the loaves of bread and fish.

In these three words—BRING THEM HERE—we see the practical application for receiving God’s provision:
Bring everything you have to Jesus and when you offer any and all of yourself and your possessions totally and willingly to God, His care is provided by extending or expanding your possessions and capabilities even to an abundance.

Trading Up – Matthew 13:44-46

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“The Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure that a man discovered hidden in a field. In his excitement, he hid it again and sold everything he owned to get enough money to buy the field. Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like a merchant on the lookout for choice pearls. When he discovered a pearl of great value, he sold everything he owned and bought it!” (Matthew 13:44-46, NLT)

In order to obtain the treasure field and valuable pearl, the field worker and the merchant first had to liquidate everything they had to raise enough capital to purchase their respective treasures.

In following Jesus we must divest our lives of all self-interest with the same totality of purpose as the man finding the treasure in the field and the merchant finding the pearl of great value.

The moral ground on which we form a relationship with God is to give up, surrender, relinquish, or abandon our own self-interests and self-will in favor of God’s will through faith in Jesus.

In other words, eliminate competing priorities.

The reason for this required sacrifice is because self-will and self-interest is the basis for sin and separation from God and hinders us from receiving God’s care and provision.

While giving up the right to self is comprehensive, in the parables of the hidden treasure and expensive pearl the totality of the sacrifice did not leave the main characters without means or substance.

God permits us to trade up!

By the very act of giving up something of less value, a fortune is secured! In His Kingdom, God invests His life in people who abdicate the kingdom of their own self-will and self-interest and make their priority doing God’s will.

Following Jesus costs you all of the only thing you really have—your right to your own self.

When you make the trade, your natural life is replaced with His Kingdom life, your destiny fulfilled, and your life possessed with immeasurable value and eternal significance.

Kingdom Entrepreneurs – Matthew 13:23

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“The seed that fell on good soil represents those who truly hear and understand God’s word and produce a harvest of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted!” (Matthew 13:23, NLT).

The parable of the sower is the first recorded parable of Jesus in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. In the parable of the sower, Jesus told about a farmer who was planting seed for crops:

  • Some of the farmer’s seed fell along the path and the birds came and ate it.
  • Some seed fell on rocky places where the soil was shallow and the plants sprang up quickly but soon withered because they had no roots.   
  • Some seed fell among thorns and the weeds didn’t allow the plants to grow. 
  • Some seed fell on good soil where a crop was produced that was many times greater than what was sown.

Jesus explained the parable of the sower to the disciples saying that the seed represented the message of the good news of the Kingdom of God—the gospel.

The farmer or the sower was, of course, God, and the different locations where the seed fell characterized the manner in which hearers of the gospel believed and received the Kingdom message.

The first category of hearers refused to believe its message while the other three categories of hearers received (and believed) the message of the gospel but responded in different ways.

Some received the message with joy but it didn’t get “rooted” or “grounded” in their lives. Some received the message but didn’t make it a priority and other obligations consumed their time and money. Yet, others heard the message and it was a life-changing experience!

Three different categories of people received (and believed) the message, but only one of the three was productive for the Kingdom of God.

These were the Kingdom entrepreneurs!

Kingdom entrepreneurs have been transformed by the message of the gospel to the extent that God uses them to effectively transact the business of His Kingdom.

God causes His Kingdom to prosper abundantly in their lives so that their profitability for the Kingdom is increased to amazing proportions! They produce a harvest of souls that can be even a hundred times greater than the seed that was planted in their lives!

As a citizen of God’s Kingdom, you are faced with some very important business decisions during your lifetime.

And, in the final analysis you must either be productive or else your service to God’s Kingdom may not be required: “To those who use well what they are given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance. But from those who do nothing, even what little they have will be taken away” (Matthew 25:29, NLT).

A Tenth of Everything? – Genesis 14:19

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“And Abram gave him a tenth of everything” (Genesis 14:19, HCSB).

When an alliance of kings from the north captured Lot and took him prisoner in a war with the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah where Lot lived, Abram (Abraham) and his 300 fighting men mounted a surprise attack and rescued Lot and his family and recovered all of Lot’s possessions.

The king of Sodom and Melchizedek, the king of Jerusalem and a priest of God, celebrated Abram’s triumph.

Although Abram gave Melchizedek a tenth of everything he owned, he refused to take anything from the king of Sodom. Abram did not want the king of Sodom to take any credit for his prosperity because Abram knew it was God that blessed him.

Abram recognized God was the enabler of his victory and the provider of his prosperity. Abram recognized that his blessedness was by the power and sovereign will of God.

If you want to be totally and completely in God’s will, then you can’t just give Jesus your heart. You also have to give him your money!

You can’t separate one from the other and Jesus made that perfectly clear: “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21, HCSB).

Some people may not tithe because they don’t really understand how God provides and meets our needs.

God does not provide for us by giving us more and more of what we already have or think we need.

If we are experiencing financial difficulties, we think that more money is the solution to our problem.
     If our home is too small, we pray for a bigger one.
          If our car is too old, we pray for a newer one.
               If we are sick, we pray for good health.

But the biblical pattern for receiving God’s provision and blessing is for Him to extend the resources we already have to meet our needs as they are offered totally and willingly to God.

Tithing is a way of doing that with our financial resources. Tithing demonstrates that we, like Abram, recognize God’s sovereignty over our lives, especially our finances.

When you tithe, you offer the basic needs of your life totally and willingly to God and by having less resources you actually give God more space to enact His supernatural care over your life.

Then God extends the 90% to cover 100% of your needs!

I know it seems contrary to good sense and everything we understand about economics, but in the economy of God’s Kingdom, less is really more!

By having less of our own resources, we make room for more of God’s provision!

It’s a faith thing!.

When you give a tenth of everything you have to God, He makes available all of everything He has to you!

“Bring the full tenth into the storehouse so that there may be food in My house. Test Me in this way,” says the Lord of Hosts. See if I will not open the floodgates of heaven and pour out a blessing for you without measure” (Malachi 3:10, HCSB).