The Hallmarks of Discipleship, Part 1

Matthew 10:24‑25

Take your Bible, if you will, and look with me at the tenth chapter of Matthew.  It is our unique and long awaited privilege to enter into an examination of Matthew chapter 10 verses 2!  to ??.  And I think it would be fitting if I read that section to you, although this morning I'm going to do nothing more than introduce it, I think it would be well to have it in mind.

Beginning at verse 24 of Matthew 10, our Lord instructing the disciples says:

"The disciple is not above his teacher, nor the servant above his lord.  It is enough for the disciple that he be like his teacher, and the servant like his lord.  If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of his household?  Fear them not therefore:  for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hidden that shall not be known.  What I tell you in darkness, that speak in light:  and what ye hear in the ear, that proclaim upon the housetops.  And fear not them who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul:

but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.  Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing?

And one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.  But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

Fear not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.

Whosoever therefore shall confess Me before men' him will I confess also before My Father who is in heaven.  But whosoever shall deny Me before men.  him will I also deny before My Father who is in heaven.  Think not that I am come to send peace on earth, I am not come to send peace but a sword.  For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter‑in‑law against her mother‑ in‑law.  And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.  He that loveth father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me:  and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after Me, is not worthy of Me.  He that findeth his life shall lose it:  and he that loseth his life for My sake shall find it.  He that receiveth you receiveth Me, and he that receiveth Me receiveth Him that sent ?e.  He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward.  And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I .say unto you, he shall in no way lose his reward."

I believe that this section of Scripture is the most crucial and the most definitive and the most monumental passage ever uttered by our Lord on the subject of discipleship.  This, in fact.

is the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ on the matter of discipleship.  What its cost is, and what it involves.  And consequently it demands our great attention.

Now the matter of discipleship is of major emphasis here at Grace Church.  We are absolutely and totally convinced that the church has a single simplified task as stated by the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew 28 when He said, "God into all the world and make disciples, baptizing them and teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always even to the end of the age."  God into all the world and make disciples.  In Matthew chapter 10 our Lord is making disciples.

He is building up disciples.  The word disciple is math?t?s.  it means learner.  He has the group of twelve and He is building them to maturity to send them out to reproduce and advance the Kingdom.

And that is the same process He has called us to be engaged in...

the process of making disciples.  This means more than leading people to Jesus Christ.  That is not the end of our commission, that is the beginning.  I never ever ascend the steps to speak in this pulpit with any other thought in my mind than build up the saints of Cod.  To put it in the terms of Ephesians, "To perfect the saints for the work of the ministry."  I believe that is the perspective of the teacher.  We are to reproduce mature disciples who in turn can reproduce themselves.  We are not interested in short circuiting that, we are not interested in short cutting that, we are not interested in minimizing that, we are interested only in the fulfillment of the goal of producing mature and reproductive disciples.

All of the teaching and preaching, all of the personal counseling.

all of the extensive ministry that goes on here and through our tapes and radio and books and everything else we do, is to take people to the point of maturity in the faith.  Now that's what our Lord was after.  He wanted people who would come and learn of Him.  He even said that.  "Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me."  Be discipled by Me.  And I really believe that that is the essence of what conversion is.  Conversion is identifying yourself as one willing to learn from Jesus Christ all things whatsoever He has commanded.

And the implication of such learning is obedience.  When you become a Christian, in effect, you are saying ‑ I choose to be a learner of the Lord Jesus Christ and to submit to such as He instructs.  That's the stuff of genuine conversion.

It isn't just meeting Jesus and ending it there.  It is affirming His Lordship, and His role as teacher, and your role as pupil....to be brought to maturity.

Now that was the Lord's task with the twelve.  That was precisely the task of the twelve with the generation they were to reach.  You see it, I think, most clearly in the Apostle paul whose great desire was to bring the saints to maturity.  Now that's my task...the task of every Christian preacher, teacher, pastor, leader.  We all have the responsibility to teach, to disciple....as you do as well in the sphere of your own ministry.

But let me see if I can't talk about that for just a moment in a context that will help us as we approach this passage.  I know what my commitment is.  I know what my calling is.  I know God has called me to teach the Word...the preach the Word...to build the saints to maturity.  I know that.  I know that's the mandate that I have from God and I am held accountable to Him to fulfill that as much as is in me possible in the power of the Spirit of God.  I know my commitment.  And my commitment is to do that although I sometimes struggle with my weakness and ignorance and the flesh, and other things, to get through to the accomplishing of that end, I know what the task is and I know that I'm committed to that task.  But what I don't know is whether you're committed to the task of learning and that's the issue.  The Lord faced that same thing.  He knew what His task was...He knew what the truth was....and He knew how to communicate the truth but what He was looking for was open hearts to receive it...the ready mind, the ready heart.

Now I know some of you enough to know that you are that ready mind.  You are that ready heart.  You want to receive the truth of God and you want having received it to implement it.

And you want your life to be being transformed.  Others of you, I know, and I'm...maybe I don't know you well enough to know that because I'm not sure where you are.  Some of you I don't know at all, so I don't know where you are.  But the real issue in the church is that the leadership is committed to doing what the Bible says to do and what we have to feel is that you're committed to receiving it when we give it.  It's like a radio program, it's one thing to broadcast, it's something else to tune in and listen.

It doesn't do us a bit of good to preach the message unless somebody is on our channel.

You know, when the radio goes out it goes out all over Los Angeles and I think 125 other cities in America now, and whether they know it or not my voice is all over the place but only a few people tune in.  And that's how it is, I think, in a sense, with the church.  There's a lot of broadcasting going on but maybe not enough receiving.  And I believe that that may be because we've never really understood the stuff of which discipleship is made and going into the Christian faith we never really understood it.

When Jesus called disciples to Himself, He really carefully instructed them in the matters of what they would be facing.  And consequently it kept out those half‑hearted people who weren't willing to make the commitment.  Jesus did the same thing when He talked about a narrow gate and a narrow way.  He kept out the people that weren't willing to make the commitment, to pay the price.  And the challenge of the Lord and the challenge of the Apostles, and the challenge of the ministers of today is to find a willing hearted people...to find an open‑hearted people...to find a responsive group who will say ‑ We will obey all things whatsoever the Lord has commanded us.  We are willing and eager and anxious no matter what the price.

Now that is the stuff of true discipleship.  That is how it is to be when you sign up to be a follower of Jesus Christ.  And I think, more than any passage we have studied, this passage is going to force you to face that reality.  The Lord really draws discipleship down to very clear issues.  And you and I as we go through this section, and we're not going to rush through it, we'll cover a little today and some more next time and then finish it out later.  But I want us to go patiently because this is such critical truth.  If you've ever wondered about dedication and...and we've all gone to churches, you know, where somebody gave an altar call and people went down and they dedicated and rededicated their lives, and we've all gone to camps, or n?st of us have, and we've seen dedication services and we've read about people who were consecrated and committed and recommitted and reconsecrated, and we've even gone through some of that catharsis of the cleansing work o.  the Spirit through the Word, and we've made new resolutions and some of them we followed up on and some of them we would find even difficult to remember.  And if you've ever wondered what the real stuff of commitment is, and where the bottom line of consecration comes, and what it really means to be set apart or sanctified, I think you'll find the answer right here.  In fact, this text is so filled with rich truth regarding discipleship that it has been the focus of Christians through the centuries and becomes the key point in learning Jesus' perspective on dedication to Himself.  If you're just kind of floating along, if you haven't really made the commitment the way it ought to be made, you're going to be forced against the wall in this passage.

I heard on the news this week about a lady whose claimed to be a Christian for several years, and gone around and given her testimony for the Lord, has just done a spread for playboy magazine.

If that kind of Christianity is what you're used to you're really going to get it in the neck in Matthew chapter lO.  Because ?hat our Lord calls us to here is infinitely something apart from that.

Now the truths in this passage, and I'm going to keep giving you some thoughts on it before we hit it, but the truths in this passage, now listen carefully to what I say here because I think it's important, are so essential because they are among the favorite teachings of Jesus.  You say ‑ Well.  how do you know that?  Because I know a little bit about what it is to be a teacher, and let me tell you how it is.  As one who teaches the Word of God I have found that there are certain key truths that you must deal with.

basic to salvation and basic to discipleship, basic to spiritual growth.  And what happens to a teacher is as he studies the Word of God for preparing to teach he finds certain concise and effective ways to communicate those basic essentials.  Like, if you point me in the middle of the night and ask me h?w to be saved, I'll pop out of bed and basically give you number 4gc in my mental catalog.  And I'll fire out salvation as I perceive it, spoken as clearly as I can speak it to make it understandable.  And I have found certain ways to express that.  And so as many times as I might travel in different places, and speak to that issue, I will find myself using some of the same terminology because as a teacher I have learned how to express that in a way that is clear, hopefully, and I've maintained that expression.

Now when it comes to basic of spiritual life, I'll go around this country and I'll be asked to speak on a certain theme and invariably when that theme intersects with principles of spiritual life, principles of discipleship, I find myself going back to the same passages, back to the same phrases, the same concepts.  and often the same illustrations because they so firmly in my mind make the point and so clearly elucidate in various circumstances what people need to understand.  In other words, there is a deposit of basic information that can be communicated effectively in a simple way.  And any teacher learns how to do that effectively and goes back to that in all different circumstances.

Now that is precisely what our Lord does in this passage.  Now listen carefully, there have been critics who have approached Matthew 10 and they have said ‑ Matthew didn't really record what Jesus said.

Matthew picked stuff from all over the place and put it together as if Jesus said it.  He took a little of what He said over here, and a little of what He said over here' and a little over here and a little over here...and they call this redaction criticism.  That Matthew is not a writer recording what Jesus actually said to His disciples, he's an editor and he's pulling it from all over everywhere and sticking it together and stuffing it in this chapter as if it were one speech by our Lord.

Now the basic error of that view is that it gives no place to repetition in the life of the teacher.  The other answer to this passage is ‑ Of course what Jesus says appears here and there all through the gospels.  You'll find almost all of these principles somewhere else but that does not mean that Jesus only said things one time in one place to one people for one purpose.  What it shows us is that like any other teacher He had truth which He drew out in all different places, all different circumstances for all different unique place and time situations and with nuances of variation, communicated the same basic stuff.

Now if you accept the redaction critic's view, first of all you've destroyed the integrity of Matthew, then you've played with the integrity of Jesus and you've, thirdly, denied the fact that a teacher has the right to repeat himself and that you can never do for the Bible itself says we learn line upon line, line upon line, precept upon precept, and precept upon precept.  The Lord here is giving us, as He gave the twelve, a body of His favorite teaching on the matter of discipleship.  And since discipleship is a matter that followed Him all through His life and which He had to deal with multiples of people in different situations, He repeats these truths over and over, sometimes changing the terms, the phrases and the point that He's making but yet using some of the same concepts and the same words to express it...  So you will find, and this is the point you need to get, that from Matthew 10 on, if you get this chapter, you are going to intersect with these same thoughts again and again as you read the rest of Matthew into Mark, into Luke, and although the terms are somewhat different you'll find the same principles in John also.  Don't deny the Lord that privilege.  This is some of His very favorite truth.

I'll even go a step further.  I think if the Lord was in panorama City today and I said to Him ‑ Would You preach this morning?  And I told Him that you all were already saved, for the most part, and that I had spent some time trying to communicate to you and so had many other teachers, and that you'd been brought along and were really pretty ready to go out and change the world.  I wouldn't be a bit surprised to hear Him tell you to open to Matthew 10.  Because, I think this instruction is so near and dear to His heart.  And that's why it's repeated so many times.  And that's why you must learn it and not just hear it but respond to it.

When you became a Christian, beloved, you did not just buy fire insurance, you did not just jump down the escape hatch from hell, you affirmed the Lordship of Christ and that means that you affirmed a response of obedience.  You said ‑ You are the teacher, I am the learner.  And you will learn all things whatsoever He has commanded you.  And if you came in on any other terms, it's questionable whether you're in at all.

Now, the people who have responded to the truths of Matthew 10:

?4 to 42 have been the kind of people who change the world.  We're talking about total dedication, total commitment, the real stuff.

nothing held back.  And those are the kinds of people who in deep self examination came to a consecration and a dedication level that set them a cut above everybody else....and made them the kind that God could use to change the course of history.

We think of Florence Nightengale, at 3O years of age she wrote this in her diary:  "I am thirty years of age, the age at which Christ began His mission.  Now, no more childish things, no more vain things."  She wrote that on her thirtieth birthday.  Years later, near the end of her illustrious and heroic life, she was asked for the secret of her life.  And this is what she said:  I can only give one explanation, that is this ‑ I have kept nothing back from God."

end quote.  Kept nothing back, that's what the Lord is talking about here.

One night Dr.  Howard A.  Kelly graduated from medical college.

You might know him for his great work at John's Hopkins as a world famed surgeon and gynecologist.  The night that he graduated from medical college he wrote this in his diary:  "Today I dedicate myself, my time, my capabilities, my ambition, everything to Him.  Blessed Lord, sanctify me to Thy uses, give me no worldly success which may not lead me nearer to my Saviour."  That remarkable man could tell many stories of what it means to be dedicated.  I remember reading one.  He was traveling in the midwest and through some circumstances needed a drink of water and stopped at a house.  Knocked at the door and asked if they could provide him a drink.  That drink was provided for him.  He remembered the name of the young girl who had given him the drink, though she didn't know who he was.  Years later that same young girl grew up and was stricken with a very serious disease and had to come to John's Hopkins for a series of surgeries.  As it turned out, Dr.  Kelly was her surgeon.  After all of the care that had to be given to her, the bill was in excess of $50 thousand dollars.

There was no insurance to cover it.  She was fearful until she received a bill said ‑ paid in full by a glass of water.  Remarkable man.

Jim Elliot, the Auca Indian martyr wrote in his diary this:

"God, I pray Thee, light these idle sticks of my life that I may burn for Thee.  Consume my life, my God, for it is Thine.  I seek not a long life but a full one like You Lord Jesus."  That's exactly what he got.  In the very flower of his youth a native threw a spear right through him.

It's this kind of dedication that we're talking about.  This is to put it in a contemporary mode so you don't think it's just something way back when.  If you know anything about revival and the history of revival in our own country, you've heard the name Jonathan Edwards....great preacher.  God used him mightily.  There was a reason.  The reason was he was willing to pay the price.  The reason was he counted the cost.  The reason was he gave everything.

He became that full fledged disciple.  He was the one with the open heart who wanted nothing other than what?  God was wanting to give him.  And he wrote this, and this was