Words of Jesus Podcast - All Must Be Forsaken

Episode Date: November 24, 2023

We attempt to negotiate our obedience to God to minimize our sacrifice. We are required to deny ourselves, to commit to our death for our faith, and to imitate Jesus. Jesus did not offer prosperity to people who came to Him. Hold everything we own in an open hand. Jesus came to teach us to be acceptable to him. He did not come for us to accept Him. Kingdom philosophy is opposite many religious doctrines - expect it. We cannot enter the Kingdom of God with this world attached to us. The gate is narrow. ***55: Jesus Rebukes James’ And John’s Desire To Misuse Spiritual PowerLuke 9:51-56AS JESUS was making his way toward Jerusalem, he sent messengers before him. They entered a village of Samaria to make ready for Jesus’ passing through that place. The Samaritans would not receive Jesus because he was going toward Jerusalem. Two of his disciples, James and John, became very angry over this and said: “Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from Heaven, and consume them, even as Elijah did?” But Jesus turned and rebuked them, saying: “Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” So they went to another village.***56: Jesus Teaches That All Else Must Be ForsakenMatthew 8:19-22; Luke 9:57-62A MAN came to Jesus and said: “Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest.” Jesus replied: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” Jesus spoke to another man, saying: “Follow me.” The man said: “Lord, suffer me to first go and bury my father.” Jesus said to him: “Let the dead bury their dead. But go thou and preach the kingdom of God.” Another man said to Jesus: “Lord, I will follow thee. But let me first go bid them farewell which are at home at my house.” To him Jesus said: “No man, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Think Red Ink Ministries presents The Words of Jesus Series with Don C. Harris Hello my friends, welcome once again to The Words of Jesus Series, Don Harris, Think Red Ink Ministries. We just finished chapter 55 in our book, which puts us at chapter 56. And this is where Jesus teaches that all else must be forsaken. Jesus was pretty emphatic

about this particular idea that we will not enter the kingdom of god when we have not forsaken all else wow that's uh that's really hard for many of us because we all have this line that we have drawn saying that when it talks about all, it comes to this line and it stops. And people draw that line in different places. Sometimes I don't think that we understand the principle that is behind this idea of forsaking everything because you know the bible teaches if you lose these things that they will be added to you you know this is not a matter of nuclear war.

It's not a matter of somebody coming into the home and killing your children. It's not a matter of your house burning down. This is a matter of people who have lost certain things along the way because of their stand, their faith in Jesus Christ, their stand in the kingdom of God. I don't think a lot of people understand that this is not just general loss. This is not only

people who turn their back on us because we're Christian. These are people on which we must turn our backs because they are simply not with us. And they're a detriment and they are a drain on our Christian life. There are some people you ought not hang around anymore since you've become a Christian. You ought not hang around anymore since you've become a Christian. You ought not hang around those people anymore. They're going to take you down. There are some people who, who's, well, you hate to, you know, assign a motive to what they're doing,

but it's really difficult to find something other than a sinister motive on their part that they're constantly dragging down your resolve to be Christian. It's like the drunk that wants you to have a drink with him. What does me drinking have to do with you drinking? I don't understand that. Well, we as Christians with understanding, we know exactly what that is. If you don't, perhaps you should get understanding

to understand that every one of us within us, we know when we're doing wrong. We know that what we're doing is frowned upon by society or our mom or our dad or our God. I'm convinced of this. You know, people say, should we teach our children the difference between right and wrong? Well, I don't know.

Maybe you ought to let your children teach you the difference between right and wrong. I think they're closer to it than we are. They know when things are wrong. They know when they're doing the wrong thing. And you do too. This is why, you know, people say, why do bad things happen to good people? There is no good people.

What planet do you live on uh why does uh god allow these things to happen to us when um you know when when we you know we're trying to do good because you're not trying to do good perhaps that is you know something you need to consider not so you would understand why the bad thing happened because i frankly don't believe that. I believe what Solomon said in the book of Ecclesiastes, hey, I'm an old man now. And here's what I found. Good and bad things happen to good and bad people. And it's a shame. Jesus says good things happen to good people, bad things happen to good people, bad things

happen to good people, and good things happen to good people bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people but you don't need to perish by them you see the principles of the scriptures explain this stuff in no uncertain you don't have to buy a book about why bad things happen to good people you don't have to do that the truth is is that we're all bad people and and why is it because we do bad things no because we go against our conscience it's one of the principles that i give you all the time keep the commandments don't go against your conscience take time every day to hear the voice of god why do you think i do that well we need to learn to listen to our consciences again you don't have to sit around nobody but nobody has ever called me and asked me,

do you really think that it's right? Is it really the right thing to do to serve mixed vegetables when there's a salad on the table? Or do you really think it's the right thing to do to wax your car too much? Or nobody ever does that. What are they calling and asking about? They're asking questions about morality, questions about what they know within themselves.

They're violating the law of God. That's why they're asking. We know these things. We just need to be honest. Well, the truth is, is that there are many things within us that we know are the right things to do. And we know that there are certain things that we do that are the wrong things to do and many times we know within ourself that all things must be given over to god all things must be forsaken all things now you might have been trained differently you might have had some preacher tell you oh yeah

join the church god needs electric guitar players oh he needs them yeah he really wants them you know you know don't lay down your talent just bring it to the church and we'll sanctify it friend i'm going to tell you something you want to use your musical talent for god lay it down let him resurrect it you want to use your talent for seeing your vocal talent your singing talent your speech talent your teaching talent i understand that we all want to serve god with whatever talents we have but you need to lay it down you need to let him resurrect it or what you're going to do is you're going to bring that stinky filthy worldly crap into the church oh i guess that's already happened never mind

or what am i trying to preserve churches sound like bars anyway well they sound like I've heard bars sound. All right. So Jesus is teaching that all... All right, too much levity? Okay. Jesus teaches that all else must be forsaken. Let's read what he had to say here. A man came to Jesus and said, Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. Ooh, that sounds like something we ought to memorize.

Sounds very churchy. In other words, do you want to think about that a minute? I don't know where you think you're going i don't know what you think this is but uh this is not your grandma's church when we say that we want to follow jesus i think a lot of times we're not you know you know how i despise the idea uh the concept the word everything about accepting jesus oh i accepted jesus when i was six i accepted jesus the other day my husband accepted jesus i i it just really really bothers me because Because what I found, he couldn't care less if you accept him.

He's not waiting for you to accept him. Here's your duty, friend. Your duty is to live in such a way that he accepts you. That goes against a lot of the faith teachers. Well, he's made me acceptable in the beloved. He's made you capable of being accepted. You're right about that. But if you think that he's imputed righteousness to you, imputed to you acceptance on his part, you're just, you're wrong. You're just absolutely wrong. I'm sorry. We don't have time to talk about so much,

add so many words to make you feel better. But you're just wrong. He's not looking for people to accept him. He's looking for acceptable people. And that can be you, if you want it to be you. But here's what you're going to have to do. You're going to have to forsake everything. You think 99% is good enough 90 if 99 is good enough certainly 98 is close enough 97 still in the same percentile right you'll dwindle that down to 65 of your life you'll do

dwindle that down to where church is 25 of your life you'll you what the let down to where church is 25 percent of your life you'll you what you'll do is is you'll do and let down until your religion is something that you do on sunday and then just half a day and then just perhaps a prayer at night teach your kids to pray over the meal oh yeah that makes christians out of them yeah good thinking now i lay me down to sleep i pray the lord to hold my soul to keep. Now, let's not let them go to sleep until they talk about death here. If I should die before I wake,

I pray the Lord my soul to take. Is that a salvation prayer? Are you really teaching your children to pray a prayer of salvation every night? Really? Is that what you're doing? You know what you're doing? No, you don't. You're just doing what everybody else is doing. You're doing what's acceptable to them. What? You don't teach your children to pray? Does the Bible teach us to pray over our food or to be thankful for it? What does it tell us to do? Well, Jesus prayed over his food. Jesus prayed a prayer of thanks

every time a meal was miraculously provided, when nets were filled with fishes, when bread was made abundant to feed 5,000 people. Yeah, of course he did. But mostly, we just need to be thankful for the most ungrateful things on the earth. You know, my pussycat looks back at me when I pour him a saucer of milk with a look of thanks on his face. And we're not even thankful to god for what we have come on we're we're just pitiful creatures you know sometimes i look at some of the things that jesus told us to do you can compare it with the way we live and i'm thinking

why doesn't he destroy us and just start all over again and i think oh my goodness he's had that thought a couple of times maybe maybe that's what will happen i don't know um but hey can we just be a little more thankful one of the things that will make you a thankful person make you a grateful person is when you forsake everything you have when you when you forsake everything you have. When you lay down everything you have, and I tell people there's nothing wrong with holding anything, as long as you hold it with an open hand. When you hold things with an open hand,

it tells the world this is mine. But it also tells the world this is yours if you need it. Wow, there's a Christian attitude. Who has that attitude? Well, precious few people, I'll tell you. But you know what? See, there's also a forsaking of things that we have. When he says you need to forsake all,

we need to be, in a lot of cases, not necessarily going and selling everything we have, like he told that poor kid that day that wanted to know how to enhance his life and move toward regeneration. But not only do we, you know, that's in the offing, that's in the possibility, the realm of possibility. That perhaps is an option. But, you know, in a lot of cases, it's just being willing. It's being willing.

Are you willing to give, perhaps, your car to someone who needs it? Well, they're really going to have to need it. I'm going to have to see a record of use of public transportation. Or they're going to have to at least walk a mile or two to work. You got all these conditions and all this stuff. You don't walk a mile to work. You don't have any record like you're asking of these people are you really loving your neighbor as yourself when i told you to keep the commandments you said you don't keep the 10 you

keep the two that's what you told me you love your neighbor as yourself i don't think you do but are we willing to hold these things that we own with an open hand are we willing to hold these things that we own with an open hand? Are we willing to hand these things over to people who need them? That is a form of forsaking all. Do you really think that the Lord is your supplier? I know you thanked God for that car when you bought it. Well, you know, the preacher's going to ask you if you did. And you better be able to say you did. Yeah, I just said thank you, Jesus, all the way home.

Well, let's just see if you're really thankful for it. See if you think that he can do it again. I don't know if I like your preaching. Well, you're not the first to say it. All right, Jesus spoke to another man saying, follow me. The man said, Lord, suffer me to first go and bury my father.

Jesus said to him, let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God. Another man said to Jesus, Lord, I will follow thee but let me first go and bid them farewell which are at home at my house. To him Jesus said, no man putting forth his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God. A couple of things here. It is said that among it may may be among america i'm sorry aramaic speaking people it may be a middle eastern thing i'm not really sure

but i understand that when it is said let me first bury my father this was not a situation where this fellow was standing in front of jesus and his dad died yesterday and it's real important to get him buried and then you know i'll meet you you know right here two days from now i'll meet you on wednesday or whatever it's not frankly i don't necessarily believe that that is the case because um you know the the way these conversations took place it was not in a situation where that death was immediate um i i have a hard time believing that if this death was immediate or imminent that this fellow would be out in the streets talking to jesus about these things but i have a tendency to believe in the idea that this was as i say either aramaic or just a middle eastern idea

let me first go and bury my father means i i need to be a part of my family until my father dies until i'm in charge of my family before i can commit to being the lord's calling him to preach the gospel and um and i think that that uh what he's what is being said here is now you know i have a tendency to default toward you know perhaps this might come as a surprise but i have a tendency to default toward the worst in mankind. I happen to know how sinful I am and how, you know, the roots I came from, the history that I have laid out in my life. I'm not really proud of who I was before the Lord changed me,

but I do have a tendency to think the worst of these situations and frankly i kind of think this is cowardice on his part you have to understand that jesus's movement in jerusalem at this time was not anywhere close to perhaps the way the jesus thing is in the town in which you live today christianity is kind of accepted as an established thing there are christians there's jews there's muslims and so people have a tendency to kind of accept that you have to understand that in this day and age there was one god one religion there was a temple there was a priesthood and i don't know what this christianity thing is you're

talking about but man that's got nothing to do with us that was their attitude jesus was there talking about something that would divide this guy from his father he jesus even warned if you're not willing to forsake your mother and your father you're not worthy of me now i think that in this particular case this guy was saying i'm not going against my dad on this my dad's a jew my dad's really not excited so much about you as i am and i think he would take it very kindly if i said i'm going to dedicate my life to preaching your gospel so can we wait until my dad's dead what was the answer well okay it's implied but what's the answer no we can't we can't wait until your father dies we can't wait until you grow up enough to be a man

and be willing to die for what you believe you're not even willing to go against your dad for what we believe and i'm telling you unless you're willing to die for what you believe you know that's what take up your cross and follow me means you know what that take up your cross means you have to deny yourself you have to make your reservation at the concentration camp you have to make your reservation for the gallows for the firing squad for the birds to pick your bones then follow me it's a requirement friend i know i know i've heard them i've heard people say that they're willing to die for jesus i'm not i'm not really so impressed by that you know i appreciate what you're saying and i'll i don't like the fact that you're saying it because i think in many cases it's said in ignorance

i don't think they're willing to die for jesus oh i think there's hundreds of people that are willing to kill for him um yeah you can find that i i always um and i listen to people talk about being willing to die for their country you think that you're willing to die for your country talk to them for a few minutes and you know what you're going to find they're willing to kill for the country not willing to die for their country there's a big difference i know death is involved but there's a difference well we have hundreds of people that are willing to kill for jesus they're willing to reject people for jesus they're willing to talk bad about people they're willing to to discredit other people other denominations and other ideas and philosophies and the us for no more attitude i know there's a lot of people like that as a matter of fact you could just find a whole

lot of people that are saying that they're willing to die for jesus but wow see what you come up with when you ask who's willing to live for him. You're not willing to live for him, but you're willing to die for him? No thanks. No thanks. You don't know the difference between being murdered and martyred. That's your trouble. You see, you can be murdered just for being a jerk.

And Christianity makes jerks out of really nice people. I don't know how it does it, but it does it. And you know, somebody can murder you because they're just sick of listening to you. But to be murdered for righteousness sake. Yeah, you're talking about martyrdom. Friend, if you don't live for Jesus, you can't die for him. Do you hear me? I know you play with little scenarios in your mind. If the jackbooted Russians come marching into your living room and say, deny Christ or I will shoot you. You'll say, I'm willing to stand there and say, shoot me. Oh, the drama is just dripping everywhere. That's not the way it's going to happen, friend.

That's not the way it's going to... You know why that won't happen? You won't even stand up to your own dad. You won't even stand up to your own wife. You better thank God there's no Russians coming into your living room and willing to kill you because it's going to expose you for what you are a big mouth hypocrite you know what learn to stand up to authority or pit or perceived authority can you stand up to your wife?

Not many men can. I'm afraid a lot of women have married their girlfriend. And if you're not willing to stand up to her, you're not willing to die for Jesus. If you're not willing to live for him, you're not even qualified to die for him. So just forget that. Forget that. Nobody's coming to kill you you nobody's coming to make you deny jesus or get shot it's not going to happen

perhaps in rare occasions i think about poor little jess uh was her name cassie burnell i think was her name that in the columbine tragedy you know she was she was actually shocked for not denying christ well this was just some stupid kid that he didn't even know who jesus was you know he didn't know he just hated christians probably school taught him how to do that but um you know i know there are rare occasions. We have a lot of friends of this ministry that live in other countries around the world. Some of the stories they tell are horrific.

So I'm not saying that these things will not happen. I'm just saying, essentially, you know, the American Christian out there, it's probably not going to happen to you. Probably not. We can't even do the slightest thing that the Lord asks us to do. I preach a little sermon called,

You Won't Do Nothing... You won't even... How does it... You won't even... You won't do nothing for God. And it's... You you know we talk about is that a double negative no it's not a double negative it pertains to the sabbath day he's not asking you to do anything and you won't even do nothing for god you're willing to die for him but you're not willing to give him his sabbath day okay all right if that makes sense to you go right ahead with it it doesn't make a lick of sense

to me our time is gone already how does that happen somebody's just talking too much i get a feeling it's not you friend I do appreciate you tuning in our way and listening to the show and I appreciate whatever emails and whatever you have sent me and to say hello and to let me know what you think of the program your questions and comments are important to me if you'd like to write to me

you can do so at don at thinkredink.com and you can write to the ministry Think Red Ink Ministries p.o box 718 pie town mexico all right till we see you again next next show i want to see you right here until then think red ink my friend bye ¶¶ © BF-WATCH TV 2021 Join us again for the next episode in the Words of Jesus series. you