Multiply Disciples

David Platt and Francis Chan have released some new material for discipleship that appears to be really good.  It's an organic movement designed to give some material to regular people to study the word of God together and replicate discipleship.  Check out the website and some of the material.  I'm looking for some ways to plug this material in our context at SSBC.

What Is the Multiply Material? from Multiply on Vimeo.

You Really Want to Follow Jesus?

I have been preaching for almost a year now through the Gospel of Luke.  We have been going walking through this gospel asking the question "What is the good news (gospel) that Luke is trying to tell us and how does that affect our lives?"  The past 2 Sundays we have been in one of the most pivotal moments in the gospel in Luke 9:18-27.  At this point in his ministry, Jesus takes his mentorship of the disciples and his requirements for following him to a different level.  He asks the disciples the most important question that everyone has to face in life, "Who do you say that I am?"  Everything in life revolves around getting that answer right.  It's the final exam question that determines whether we pass or fail.  If you get the wrong answer to that question, the rest of your life will be off course with God.

Peter boldly gives the correct answer, "You are the Christ of God."  That answer has multiple layers of implications to it.  If Jesus is not the Christ, the Son of God, then following him is useless.  He was either extremely delusional or deceptive.  However, if Jesus really is the Christ, and you truly believe that, then there are dramatic implications on our lives that follow.  That is why Jesus then gives them the first proclamation of the gospel in verse 22 and then gives them very costly consequences of obedience and following him in verse 23.

Based on this text, I saw three essential elements of true salvation and three essential elements of true discipleship that I preached these past two weeks.

The Essential Elements of True Salvation

1.  True Salvation Requires a Bold Confession of the Person of Christ (verse 18-20) - Just like Peter, we must boldly confess that we too believe that Jesus is the "Christ" of God.  He is the Anointed One.  He is the only begotten Son of God sent from heaven.  He is the sinless Son who came in full obedience to his Father to meet all the righteous requirements of the law and to die in full payment for the sins of man.  We cannot just say that we like Jesus.  We cannot just stop at saying "Yes, Jesus is God's Son", because there are a million other follow-up questions that must be asked.

2.  True Salvation Requires a Deep Conviction in the Gospel of Christ (verse 21-22) - After Peter correctly answered the question about Jesus' personhood, Jesus then gave them a clear proclamation about his work.  We have to fully understand both Jesus person and his work for the gospel to make sense to us.  Jesus tells his disciples that he will be handed over to the religious leaders and killed and rise again three days later.  In Matthew's gospel, he records that at this point Peter tries to interrupt Jesus and tell him that cannot happen. This is not the "Christ" or "Messiah" that Peter and the others had in mind.  It's a reminder that we can know the truth about who Jesus is, but completely miss the truth of what he came to do.  Being truly saved means that we feel a deep conviction in our life about the gospel, that we trust in Christ's payment for our sin, that we by faith fully rely on his work on the cross and trust him as Savior and Lord.

3.  True Salvation Requires a Radical Commitment to Follow After Christ (verse 23-26) - Jesus then ties into the statement about the gospel the radical consequences of those who want to follow him.  He says in essence, "I am going to Jerusalem where they are going to kill me, but I will rise again.  Now, if you want to follow me, forget about yourself, take up your cross, and come on."  This is radical obedience.  And, this is the radical obedience that has been missing for the most part in churches in the American culture for a long time.  I will break these down a little further below in the sermon I preached yesterday.

The Essential Elements of True Discipleship

There are lots of people that like to identify with Jesus somehow.  There are millions in our country that claim allegiance to Christ.  However, it is clear that not all who claim to be "Christians" are truly converted or following him.  Unfortunately,deeply embedded in our American consciousness is the desire to be sovereign over our own lives.  The result is that many try to follow Jesus on their own terms and many churches have become safe havens for the falsely converted and comfortably religious, but lost.  Jesus makes very hefty demands in verses 23-26 on what it truly means to follow him.

1.  True Discipleship Requires a Determined Submission to Follow After Christ (verse 23) - Jesus has already said that the path of following him ends in death and resurrection.  If we want salvation, we have to be willing to die to self and be born again in new life.  Jesus makes this clear when he says if we follow him, we must deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow him.  Self-denial means saying "good-bye" to your former life before meeting Christ.  It means putting your agenda in submission to him.  Taking up your cross is not just having to deal with the troubles of this world, but a complete and daily dying to self.  It means daily confessing that "I am crucified with Christ, and I no longer live."  Following him means that we go where Jesus goes.  We don't determine the direction of our lives.

2.  True Discipleship Requires a Complete Surrender to the Cause of Christ (verse 24-25) - Jesus says that we cannot try to live our lives in such a way to accumulate things for our own significance.  If we try to "save" our lives by our own effort, we will lose them.  But if we "lose" our life in complete surrender to Christ, we find true salvation and purpose as God designed us.  He further illustrates this question with a tragic picture of a man who achieves all the earthly success that he is longing for, but has to give up his eternal soul in the process.  We cannot be surrendered to Jesus and sold out to the things of this world at the same time.

3.  True Discipleship Requires a Courageous Identification with the Person of Christ (verse 26) - Finally, Jesus says that we cannot live our lives ashamed to be associated with him.  We must boldly wear the name of Jesus and bear all the consequences of that.  We must face ridicule, rejection, scorn, criticism, slander, imprisonment, persecution, and even death if necessary because Jesus Christ faced all that for us.  We must passionately reject the cultural Christianity of our day that makes Jesus look like a peace-loving hippie and requires nothing to follow him.

What say you?  Have you thought through the dramatic consequences and costs that Jesus gives to follow him?  Or, have you been the victim of a pasteurized Christianity that has been conveniently sanitized of all the demands on our lives?  Truth is, because of what Jesus has done for us on the cross, I really see no other way to respond other than full allegiance and submission to go wherever he goes, to pay whatever it costs to follow him.

This is the Gospel Project

I am excited about the release of a new curriculum by Lifeway called "The Gospel Project".  There has been a lot of buzz being generated for this release for several months now.  From what I have seen, it may be the best small group curriculum Lifeway has produced in a long time.  Our children's and youth ministry at SSBC is using it this fall.  A couple of our adult classes will be as well.  I would highly encourage all of our Sunday School classes and small groups to give it a try.

They showed this video at the SBC last month that gives an overview of it.

The Lure of Conformity

I always feel this need to conform to expectations around me. I think all of us do.  Let me illustrate.  The other day I came across a fellow pastor in my city.  He's a new guy in the area and he had that look of a pastor: dress pants, shined shoes, pressed blue shirt, yellow tie, distinguished glasses, and closely cropped hair.  Me? I had on blue jeans, polo shirt, tennis shoes, and a three-day growth of stubble on my face.  He looked like a pastor.  I looked like one of those guys who sits around playing video games and eating oreos. I began to think to myself, "You need to do a better job looking like a pastor when you go out."  There is a group of pastors that meet on Monday in my town and when I go to their meetings I usually put on khakis and a golf shirt or something business casual.  When I went to the Dominican I brought all athletic pants and Under Armor shirts because I knew all the guys were baseball guys and coaches.  I wanted to look the part even if I wasn't the part.  When I go to a gospel conference in April, everyone will be dressed in the standard YRR attire (except for Al Mohler who will still be sporting the suit and tie seminary president look). 

The lure of conformity is a powerful thing.  It doesn't go away when we graduate from high school.  Peer pressure isn't just something teenagers face.  We all face it everyday.  There's pressure to conform to the fashion trends of our tribe.  There's the pressure to conform to the large-scale SUV when you have two kids and live in suburbia.  There's pressure to preach like Andy Stanley, have music like Louie Giglio and Passion, and have a church big enough to transport people in golf carts across the parking lot.  There's pressure to get your son or daughter lessons so he or she can be as good or better than all the other kids at baseball or soccer.  There's pressure to be on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and every other social site to be relevant. 

Even those who say they are non-conformists have their pressures to conform.  Ever seen a skinhead with long blonde locks?  If you want to be a "non-conformist" you need to have multiple piercings, a long goatee, like wearing black, and have an angry demeanor most of the time.

The issue really isn't whether it's wrong to feel the pressure to conform, but what you are being conformed too.  The things we conform to can often times reveal to us what our functional idols really are.  My need to dress more like a pastor can possibly be signaling a need to be validated by external measurements rather than spiritual ones.  My desire for new golf clubs might be a sign that I want people to be impressed with the "Callaway" on my 9-iron. (However, I really think it's because my current clubs stink.)  When my need to conform is driven by other people's expectations or acceptance rather than my personal convictions, it will usually lead me down the path of idolatry and be less fulfilling. 

The real question is "Why do I feel so strongly the pull to conform to those around me, but don't always feel the need to conform to Christ-likeness as strong?"  It's not my desire to conform that bothers me but the things I desire to conform to and my struggle to conform to Christ-likeness.  The Bible says I am "predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son."  It will happen eventually.  That's the plan of God for me.  The word also says "As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance."  It's my choice what I conform to.  When I allow myself to be conformed to the pattern of this world, I show my ignorance of the gospel and all the things that God has done for me already in Christ.  I think that word "ignorant" best describes much of the conformity I see in my life and in the lives of those around me.  That's what I think bothers me the most.

Anyway, let's all conform (which is a statement asking you to conform) to the things that really matter in this world or the next.  And let's pay careful attention to the lure of conformity and ask ourselves why we feel so drawn to what we are.

Now I got to go press my slacks.  I have a pastor's meeting to go to...

Left Everything

I was enjoying some time in God's word this morning with a cup of coffee on my front porch.  Reading through my Bible plan, I journeyed through Luke 5 this morning.  This is Luke's account of Jesus' early ministry.  It includes the calling of his first disciples.  It was a powerful reminder of Jesus' authority and his transformative power.  In both the calling of Peter, Andrew, James and John in verse 11 and the calling of Levi in verse 28 the common denominator is that they "left everything and followed him."  That's just amazing!  These men saw something in Jesus so awesome that they turned their backs on what they had devoted their whole life to and walked with him into an uncertain future.  Peter and the boys had just experienced a haul of fish like no other.  They had been doing this for years, and had never had a day like this.  It was so miraculous that Peter trembled in fear before the Lord and asked him to leave because he was scared of his own sinfulness before the Messiah.  At the moment of their greatest prosperity, they left it all and walked away.  They left the secure and familiar for the unknown.  They decided that they would rather be with Jesus than have a secure future.  Jesus would make it very clear soon that there would be no personal gain.  When Jesus would turn away the Rich Young Ruler because of his unwillingness to do the same, Peter would remind Jesus that "we have left everything and followed you.  What then will we have?"

How different is this call from Jesus for immediate and costly obedience than the attitude of most in the church today that want Jesus AND everything else?  How different is this from the promise that you can have "your best life now"?  How do we reconcile this call with the fact that the average church goer gives less than 3% of his income to kingdom related causes?  How do we reconcile this call for costly abandonment with church-goers who are over-mortgaged and parking $40,000 vehicles in church parking lot?  I am not advocating that having resources is an evil or sinful thing.  I know that God does allow for financial prosperity in some of his children.  However, he does this so that after we have abandoned their hold on us we can use them to multiply his kingdom.  This fact that the majority of disciples will not leave everything to only have Jesus is shown in my own denomination where we are bringing missionaries home and cannot send people ready to go because churches and members are not giving enough to meet budgetary needs.  However, just last week, I took myself and my oldest three boys to a college football game.  I was in a stadium with 87,000 people where the average ticket was at least $70 face value and the average person probably spent close to $40 or more on concessions.  All this for a three-hour game.  Is it a sin to enjoy football and go experience it? No.  I had a great time!  It was a much needed break for me and a memory for my children.  However, I also know that I need to do a much better job of modeling for them the "abandonment attitude" of the gospel.  My heart and theirs are battling the idol of materialism way too much.

I wonder if Jesus walked into our worship service tomorrow and said to the assembled worshipers, "Follow Me" if we would have the same response Peter, James, Andrew, John, and Levi did?  Or, would we go consult our financial advisor to make sure we had enough already stored in our 401k first?  Would we model "immediate abandonment" or would we be like the man in Luke 9 who said "First, let me go and bury my father."  What do you think?

"What Bible Should I Use?"

As a pastor, this is one of the questions I get asked a lot over the years.  It usually comes up when someone is looking to buy a Bible for someone in their family or when someone who's been using King James since childhood finally decides to try something else.  Honestly, it was not a question I gave a lot of thought to for the first 10+ years of my ministry.  I would usually answer with "New International Version" because it was the most popular and every preacher I knew used it.  However, sometime around 2004 I picked up a copy of Leland Ryken's The Word of God in English from a recommendation at John MacArthur's Shepherd's Conference.  It was the first time I began to seriously investigate the issue of Bible translation and why it's so important.

First, you need to know that the leading factor driving most of the Bible translation market is "what sells."  Most (not all) Bible publishers only want to produce what they can sell.  Marketing is the master.  This is why you see versions like the New International Version and the New Living Translation advertised so much.  It's not because they are better translations.  It's because they sell well, the publishers can put slick covers on them, and those names are familiar.  Most publishers are not primarily concerned with delivering a faithful and true text of Scripture.  What good does it do to have an accurate translation if you can't sell it?  This is why the New American Standard Bible (probably the most accurate) still only encompases about 2% of Bible sales every year.  John MacArthur tried to publish his first edition of the MacArthur Study Bible in NASB because that is what he preaches out of.  His publisher denied it because NASB doesn't sell.  It was only after he sold hundreds of thousands of NKJV editions that they agreed to release it in NASB.

The issue of Bible translation really comes down to understanding what drives translators.  Basically there are two historic schools of Bible translation.  One is the "formal equivalent" (FE) crowd which tries to be more "word-for-word" when translating.  The other is the "dynamic equivalent" (DE) crowd which tries to be more "thought-for-thought."  The FE crowd desires to get the most accurate translation to what the author says as possible.  The DE crowd desires to interpret what the author was saying and then put it in more modern, understandable terms.  Both of these ideas are difficult because of the syntax of the Greek language.  Greek sentence structure makes a "word-for-word" translation difficult to read.  However, trying to alter the text to fit a nice English structure can lose much of the author's meaning.  The basic historical formal equivalent translations are King James Version, New King James, Revised Standard Version, and New American Standard.  The basic dynamic equivalents are Good News Bible, Contemporary English Version, The Message, and the New Living Translation.  The New International Version claims to be an balance between the two, but leans heavily towards dynamic equivalence in my opinion. 

I have come to the conclusion that I want to have as accurate a translation as possible for both my personal study and for my preaching.  I do have several versions that would be dynamic equivalence that I look at sometimes to see an alternative way to say a text.  However, I think not having an accurate translation hinders people from being grounded in the sufficiency of God's word.  There are deep theological truths buried deep within the greek words and structure.  I don't think that a group of translators can accurately understand or convey what Paul or Peter were thinking enough to put it in modern terms.  I think that DE translations have helped foster the rampant biblical illiteracy we have in the American church.  We have more Bible translations than any culture at any time in history.  At the same time, we have more ignorance to what God's word says and alignment with it than at any time.

A few years ago a group of scholars released a new FE translation called the English Standard Version.  Crossway, a major publisher, has put a lot of money into marketing this very good text of Scripture.  Several well-known scholars were brought in to work on the project and many strong expositors and preachers have endorsed it.  Their website, esv.org, is an excellent one.  You can read the Bible on there.  You can work through a Bible reading plan.  This is the Bible I preach from every week and will continue to do so for a long time.  Here are some reasons why:

1. It's extremely accurate to the Greek text.  I don't know Hebrew, so I can't comment on that.  However, when I have translated and compared to ESV, I find it to be strong.
2. It's very readable.  Although it is a FE text, it is not as difficult to read as KJV or NASB.  It reads a lot like the more popular New International Version but stays much more true to the text.
3. It's affordable.  Crossway has done a good job of keeping these translations where people can buy them.  The Bible I preach from each week is a thinline version that can be bought on Amazon for about $20.  The ESV Study Bible is one of the best I have ever seen and can be bought in hardback for about $30.  
4. It's popular.  Most of the guys I like to listen to preach are now using ESV.  Men like Matt Chandler, Francis Chan, Mark Driscoll, David Platt, John Piper, and James MacDonald use it.  These men are diligent, faithful theologians and scholars with a deep pastoral heart.  

Here is a great video to watch with some endorsements:

ESV Trusted By Leaders from Crossway on Vimeo.

I would recommend to every one of my church members to get a copy of the ESV and dive deep into it.  Memorize Scripture from it.  Rest in the fact that you can read it and know that you are reading a faithful text written much like the Apostles wrote.  The issue of Bible translation is not a matter of taste.  Not every version of the Bible says the same thing.  It does matter what you read and what version shapes your theology and ultimately your obedience.

Here is a vimeo website by Crossway with other important videos on the ESV and Bible translations.  There are some great interviews on there. 

A Costly Obedience

I have been reading this week in John Piper's book "Filling Up the Afflictions of Christ" about the lives of William Tyndale, John Paton, and Adoniram Judson. It's the latest in his biographical sketches in The Swans Are Not Silent series. This series is phenomenal in giving an understanding of the price paid by those who were faithful to the gospel. This particular book gives sketches of the deep price these men paid through suffering and martydom to make sure that those who didn't have access to the gospel or God's word could have that access. It reminded me that we in America have become so used to a Costless Christianity. We have no idea in the American church what it means to suffer for Christ. Ironically, we have also lost our missional passion at the same time. We have bowed down far too long at the idols of convenience, pleasure, and prosperity. We have seen our churches turn into religious social clubs. Our idea of suffering is watching Bill Maher make fun of us.

I am so thankful for men like William Tyndale who was exiled from his homeland and eventually butchered for believing that justification by faith alone mattered and that people should have God's word for themselves instead of being imprisoned to a works-based church. I am thankful for men who understood that the long-term implications of the gospel were more important that short-term comfort. While I do not pray for suffering, I do pray for an awakening in the church that the gospel is worth whatever price is demanded to proclaim it.