Luke 14:28-33

Luke 14:28-33 “Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, saying, ‘This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.’ “Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Will he not first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.

Life is a river, not a pond. Life is action, not repose. Life is planning the next move, not going with the flow. As with Jesus and the disciples, life is walking to the next city to win some, not just staying home and praying for someone else to go. Life is movement, not inertia. In the above passage, Jesus talks about the lifestyle expressed in the book of James: show me your faith by your deeds, not just with your words. The New Testament is full of this WORK-FAITH. Jesus and the apostles were constantly on the move, walking the dusty roads from one town to the next, from one region to the next, always teaching the kingdom of God is near. Consequently, the gospel spread like wildfire. In Acts we find the apostles and their converts on fire for God, giving up everything to follow Jesus. We even see them fleeing from one city to another to escape persecution, but still with a testimony on their lips. This may all sound like the antithesis of Psalms 23: The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters. Yet this is our commission from the Lord as we go out to all the world to preach the gospel, God's message of love.

Many times, Christians seek a Psalms 23 existence, wanting God to show us the still waters and green pastures in life. We want rest, quietness, less turbulent waters. But we usually do not find it here because Christianity is an action word. Christianity is moving, not contemplating, not reclining, not preserving our strength, our sanity. We are strangers, moving through this land. Like Abraham the father of faith, we seek a city made by God's hands. We are not people incapsulated by our houses and green lawns, tied to this land. That is not where we, people of faith, live; this is not where the kingdom of God is and where we do the King's work. Well then, what about all this talk of rest? Does God give rest? Is there no still water? Yes, there is, for God gives rest to our spirit man. He says, stop trying to be a Christian through your works of goodness; instead, rest in my work, accomplished through Jesus Christ. By faith enter through the only door and lie down in the green pasture by the still water. God says, I have done it all for you. You are mine. The work is finished, accomplished. Therefore, heaven is our home, and death has been conquered, for we are ALIVE IN CHRIST EVERMORE.

Jesus implies if we desire to be his disciples, we must commit wholeheartedly, a 100 percent, to follow him. If we want God's kingdom work accomplished, we cannot sit back and say everything will come to fruition without our involvement. Christians have to put their total effort into living a life for Christ. A faith life takes effort. Abraham did not get to another country without effort. The Israelites did not enter the Promised Land without effort. The church did not expand throughout the world without effort. To live lives of faith, requires work, a lot of work, and not just work to save our personal souls. In Christ that battle has been won, but work is required to further the kingdom of God. Christians cannot sit back and say it is not important whether I am in the battle or not. We cannot say that gathering together as a community of believers is unimportant. We cannot say our testimony is not needed. We must understand that God needs our legs, our mouths, our lives for his purposes.

Too many of us sit in the back pasture, waiting for God to discover us as Solomon discovered David. David worked in the field and was ready to do God's bidding. Now we are the Davids, the men and women of war. Jesus has discovered us. Therefore, we need to get up and do HIS WORK as his faithful disciples. In a day of electronics, we can visit the sick, the hurting, the desperate without even leaving our homes. In many ways in this age, we can perform God's work without much effort. Our cars carry us quickly to someone's house to comfort the sick or grieving. We can send an email or letter or make a quick phone call to an elderly person or someone who is discouraged. We can go anoint someone with oil and pray for God's victory in their lives without much effort. There is just no reason we should hide out in our homes in front of our televisions, making them a place of stagnant waters. Hiding from your troubled workplace or the activities of life is not God's will. We should not spend our physical lives reclining by the pond, surrounded by green pasture, waiting for Jesus' return. Our lives should be in the turbulent river of life where we rescue the desperate, the people who are drowning. As his disciples, his light and salt, we will be there. Praise the Lord of the harvest who gives us strength to do his will.