I am blessed to be a member of a church that takes the demands of the Gospel of Jesus Christ seriously. Lately, we as a body have dove in together into the controversial and radical terms that Jesus gives as requirements to being His disciple. These terms are frequently overlooked or ignored completely by the majority of churches in America. The result is that the majority of people in American churches who believe themselves to be followers of Christ are deceived because they have come to Jesus on their terms and not His. This is a frightening reality. My pastor, Dr. David Platt, recently wrote a book entitled, Radical, that expresses these truths from Scripture in detail. Below is a video promotion for the book gives a brief illustration of the a true call to a disciple of Christ. I pray that God will have mercy upon us and give us grace to truly walk the narrow path.
Radical by David Platt from Taylor Robinson on Vimeo.
Yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. ~Proverbs 2:3-5
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- Daniel Fuller
- Greetings! My name is Daniel, and I am 24 years old. I am a born again Christ follower. I hope the content of this blog will bless you in some fashion and the Lord will show you His glory!
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Hey man. I always appreciate your comments. Always a blessing. Yeah, the video is definitely not fully reflective of David Platt's view on the subject. He definitely thinks we should take Jesus' words literally. Here's an example. In the book he recounts receiving a Christian news publication in the mail. He says, "The front cover had two headlines side by side...On the left one headline read, 'First Baptist Church Celebrates New $23 Million Building.' A lengthy article followed, celebrating the church's expensive sanctuary. The exquisite marble, intricate design, and beautiful stained glass were all described in vivid detail. On the right was a much small article. The headline for it read, 'Baptist Relief Helps Sudanese Refugees...' The article describe how 350,000 refugees in western Sudan were dying of malnutrition and might not live to the end of the year. It briefly explained their plight and sufferings. The last sentence said that Baptists had sent money to help relieve the suffering of the Sudanese. I was excited until I got to the amount...On the right the article said, 'Baptists have raised $5,000 to send to refugees in western Sudan.' Five thousand dollars. That is not enough to get a plane into Sudan, much less one drop of water to people who need it...Where have we gone wrong? How did we get to the place where this is actually tolerable? Indeed, the cost of nondiscipleship is great. The cost of believers not taking Jesus seriously is vast for those who don't know Christ and devastating for those who are starving and suffering around the world. But the cost of nondiscipleship is not paid solely by them. It is paid by us as well...If we walk away from the Jesus of the Gospel, we walk away from eternal riches. The cost of nondiscipleship is profoundly greater for us than the cost of discipleship. For when we abandon the trinkets of this world and respond to the radical invitation of Jesus, we discover the infinite treasure of knowing and experiencing him."
I'm hoping that clarifies. Here's the scary thing to me. This invitation of "sell everything you have" that Jesus gave to the rich young man was the initial terms of following Him. It wasn't Jesus calling him to move into the advanced phase of Christianity. So what does that look like in our culture? What does it look like to sell your possessions and give to the poor? The message is clear, but as husbands and fathers we also have to consider the implications of doing that and it's affect on our families. Obviously, we want to make sure we take care of our wives and children, but we are definitely not given grounds to lavish stuff on them. What do you think about that?
Wow I totally had this long response and just lost it all lol. Okay I will just touch on the big things.
I do not think Jesus would ever advocate leaving your wife. That would result in divorce and that would be inconsistent with the rest of Scripture, especially since marriage is a portrait of Jesus' relationship to the church.
In our culture I'm wondering how effective it is for the spread of the Kingdom to give up everything and follow Christ. A lot of the resources we have are used to venture into countries we have never been able to go before and take the Gospel to them. I don't think that would be possible if every Christian left their jobs and homes and started walking. See what I'm saying? I don't want to beat the straw man and make it seem like I don't agree with Jesus' teaching here. I most certainly do. I'm more so trying to wrestle through the practicalities of it.
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