"For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard." (Acts 4:20) "And he answered and said unto them. I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out." Luke 19:40) "Return to thine own house, and shew how great things God hath done unto thee" (Luke 8:39) "For whoever may be ashamed of me and of my words...." (Luke 9:26a)
Preface: Dealing on a daily basis with both a collapsing church and a collapsing nation does not bode well for smooth sailing in one's life. It's not good enough to just rant on about how bad Progressivism is for America....or how terrible Liberalism is for the church. That's the easy part of this whole mess.....and that's where most conservatives have settled in. It's when you go beyond those obvious enemies to the deceivers or the lazy or the ignorant in our own camp that the waters get rough and the winds blow fiercely. Whereas in the former....the 'cost of discipleship' can almost make one a hero....for everyone rails against Progressivism....but in the latter....where we look inwardly....one can become a pariah in one's own family and church and community. The former is more a badge....whereas in the latter it can be more of a wound.
The Cost Of Discipleship....August 3, 2017
One of the failures of today's evangelicalism is that we fail to mention the cost of discipleship when we evangelize and I have been guilty of this as much as anyone. I put a couple thousand miles on our vehicle recently and that usually means listening to a few more sermons from R. C. Sproul than I usually do. I had to go back into his archives a little bit to find one that I had not heard and I'll give you easy directions to listen to it at the end of this post. I need not add that what you will hear will be eons in wisdom and knowledge beyond what I can type out!.
You have close friends....maybe you have a wife and children....maybe even grown children. If your plans are in just joining into fellowship of a church because it's something that you think that you should probably do...don't worry about the cost of discipleship. You may annoy a person or two, and you may even offend someone, but you probably won't find that there is a quantifiable cost to you involved in your decision to become a Christian. Of course you'll be pretty much useless to the spread of the gospel but hey....you get what you pay for.
Your parents...whom you deeply love...may show deep disappointment in you. R. C. had this happen to him with his mother, and I experienced the same thing. It's very difficult and in my case it turned out to be decades of praying for wisdom in presenting the gospel to my mother....and asking for forgiveness for the times that I felt that I failed miserably. It would have been so much easier to avoid the topic....but then I'm one of those strange birds who actually believe that one has to be born again....and I loved my mother too much to let a little thing like her disowning me stop me from telling her about Jesus Christ.
A good friend will stay your friend but you will wind up either....one....letting him alone in his life without Christ....or two....you will try again and again to present the gospel to him and thus you may find that although you are still friends....you really don't have much to talk about anymore. Still, unless your parents disown you and all your friends avoid you like the plague then this also does not appear on the cost ledger.
Doctrine does come with a cost. The word doctrine is simply a biblical truth that often is not simple....but often essential in becoming a Christian. If you stay with the basics then there will be little to no cost to you. Do you have a serious hobby? Most people do. Is there something you have worked at for years and you excel at? Maybe you are a scratch golfer? I was a scratch golfer....I'd hit the ball and have to scratch my head but maybe you actually know how to play the game? If you apply yourself to the Word of God in like manner then it will most likely cost you....because people generally have their own doctrine that is very palatable to their specific tastes. You may have to leave the church that you love. Other Christians may consider you divisive.....but there is One that will not abandon you.
These are really minor costs compared to what others have paid. Your wife may wind up leaving you. Your kids may hardly ever bring the grand kids over. I've witnessed these things with friends. We have all read stories in the news where Christians lost their business or their livelihood because of their Christian faith. Every one of us should never allow much time to pass without thinking about and praying for Christians around this world whose cost to them was their lives or their families.
These words were brief and not very profound. My intention was not to make a list of things that will cost you but rather to point out that we fail to mention any costs at all as we ....'share the gospel.' This sets the person in question up for some rude awakenings that may result in their abandoning their faith. This failure to mention a cost also winds up adding enormously to an American church filled with people who have never been born anew....born from above.....nor do they even know what that means,
Google....R. C. Sproul, The Cost Of Discipleship, Part II
