Hating Those We Love Most . . . Because Jesus Is Better!

Jesus gives us one of His most shockingly hard commands in Luke 14:26:

If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. Luke 14:26-27

In this passage, Jesus demands absolute, undivided love, commitment, and devotion to Himself above everything else and without any rival that is even close. The love we are to have for Jesus should make all other loves in our lives (even that strongest kind of love found between family members) seem like hatred in comparison. Only if we have this kind of love for Christ will we be able to love the lesser goods in our lives (like our families) as they should be loved. Only by trusting, loving, and adoring Jesus Christ far and away above all can we even begin to love our neighbors as ourselves or love our wives as Christ loves the church.

Beware of idolizing the good gifts from God in your life.

Timothy Keller wrote:

We think that idols are bad things, but that is almost never the case. The greater the good, the more likely we are to expect that it can satisfy our deepest needs and hopes. Anything can serve as a counterfeit god, especially the very best things in life . . . What is an idol? It is anything more important to you than God, anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, anything you seek to give you what only God can give.

A counterfeit god is anything so central and essential to your life that, should you lose it, your life would feel hardly worth living . . . It can be family and children, or career and making money, or achievement and critical acclaim, or saving "face" and social standing. It can be a romantic relationship, peer approval, competence and skill, secure and comfortable circumstances, your beauty or your brains, a great political or social cause, your morality and virtue, or even success in the Christian ministry. (Pages xvii-xviii)

What in your life do you need to look straight in the eyes and say:

I hate you . . . compared to Jesus?

It could be your family, your blog, or even your Christian ministry. Pray that Christ would be precious to you far above everything else!

May Christ be your all in all!

Helpful Resources On This Teaching Of Jesus

1. If You Don’t Hate Your Father, You Cannot Be My Disciple: THE DISCOMFORTING SAYINGS OF CHRIST by John Piper

2. The Cost of Discipleship by R. C. Sproul

3. What Will Jesus Cost You? by Ligon Duncan

To learn more about the great Triune God, the God-Man, Jesus Christ, and His glorious Gospel message and everlasting Kingship, please watch American Gospel: Christ Alone. You can watch the full documentary here with a free, 3 day trial.

Trust And Adore: The Death Of Legalism

Geerhardus Vos wrote:

"Faith in its last analysis was to the patriarchs the apprehension, the possession, the enjoyment of God Himself . . . Legalism lacks the supreme sense of worship. It obeys but it does not adore."

Apparently, Vos was a Christian Hedonist!


Geerhardus Vos, Redemptive History And Biblical Interpretation, The Shorter Writings Of Geerhardus Vos (Phillipsburg: P&R, 1980), 229, 231.

We Cannot Esteem Christ Enough

Spurgeon said:

"My Master has such riches that you cannot count them. You cannot guess them, much less can you convey their fullness in words. They are unsearchable! You may look, and search, and weigh, but Christ is a greater Christ than you think Him to be when your thoughts are at the greatest.

My Master is more able to pardon than you to sin, more able to forgive than you to transgress. My Master is more ready to supply than you are to ask, and ten thousand times more prepared to save than you are to be saved. Never tolerate low thoughts of my Lord Jesus. Your highest estimates will dishonor Him.

When you put the crown on His head, you will only crown Him with silver when He deserves gold. When you sing the best of your songs, you will only give Him poor, discordant music, compared with what He deserves. But Oh! Do believe in Him, that He is a great Christ, a mighty Saviour.

Great sinner, come and do Him honor by trusting in Him as a great Saviour. Come with your great sins, and your great cares, and your great wants! Come and welcome. Come to Him now, and the Lord will accept you, and accept you without upbraiding you."

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, "The Unsearchable Riches of Christ," in Spurgeon’s Sermons, Vol. 9 (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1996), 259-260.

HT: Tolle Lege

May Christ Ravish Us All!

John Donne wrote:

"Batter my heart, three personed God; for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine and seek to mend.
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn and make me new,
I, like an usurped town, to another due,
Labor to admit you, but, oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend;
But is captive and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you and would be loved fain;
But am betrothed unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me."

(John Donne, "Batter My Heart")

What It Cost To Be The Good Shepherd!

The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing. Psalm 23:1

This amazing truth is ultimately fulfilled in the Good Shepherd - the Lord Jesus Christ. Only in Him is this supernatural satisfaction fully realized, and for this realization to happen, Jesus had to lay down His life for the sheep. The shepherd had to become the slain sheep struck down by the wrath of God:

Zechariah 13:7: "Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me," declares the LORD of hosts. "Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered . . . ." (See also Matthew 26:31 & Mark 14:27)

John 10:11: I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Hebrews 13:20-21: Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. 

1 Peter 2:25: For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.  

1 Peter 5:4: And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.

 Jesus had to lack everything for His sheep.

Instead of the LORD being His shepherd, the LORD was His judge and cursed Him (Galatians 3:13)

Instead of lacking nothing, He lacked everything as He cried out "My God! My God! Why have You forsaken Me?!" (Matthew 27:46)

 

Instead of rest in green pastures, He had no place to lay His head (Matthew 8:20) 

Instead of still waters, He was baptized with the wrath of God (Luke 12:50) 

Instead of a restored soul, His soul was poured out unto death (Isaiah 53:12) 

Instead of being led in right paths, He was led as a sheep to the slaughter and offered Himself as a propitiation so that God might be proved righteous (Acts 8:32, Romans 3:25-26) 

Instead of fearing no evil in the dark death valley, He was made evil Who knew no evil and sorrowed unto death as He contemplated the darkness of death that would utterly consume Him (2 Corinthians 5:21, Mark 14:34-36) 

Instead of having God with Him as His comfort, God forsook Him, pouring out His just wrath upon Him (Matthew 27:46) 

Instead of having a rod and a staff to comfort Him, the rod of the Father was pleased to crush Him (Isaiah 53:10) 

Instead of having a table spread before Him, He hungered in the wilderness and thirsted unto death - God prepared a table for Him with His enemy who sold Him over to death for 30 pieces of silver (Luke 4:1-2, John 19:28; Matthew 27:1-5)

Instead of having His head anointed with oil, He wore a blood-soaked crown of thorns, and His head was anointed with His own precious blood (Matthew 27:29) 

Instead of having a cup that overflows, He drank the cup of the wrath of God to the dregs (Isaiah 51:17, Matthew 26:39) 

Instead of goodness and mercy pursuing Him all the days of His life, wrath and torment pursued Him unto death (Isaiah 53) 

Instead of dwelling in the house of the LORD, He was banished from the dwelling of the LORD as the unclean and cursed one (Galatians 3:13) 

Jesus had to lack everything as He Himself became the Lamb Who was slain (Revelation 5:6, 12). And He did all of this on behalf of stubborn, sinful, hell deserving sheep who rebelled against Him. This is the best news in the world! All who know this Good Shepherd by grace alone through faith alone will lack no good thing, for He will provide for them, protect them, comfort them, and satisfy them fully - He will be all and all to them now and forever and ever:

Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple; and He Who sits on the throne will shelter them with His presence. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their Shepherd, and He will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Revelation 7:15-17

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Christ Jesus Is My Shepherd LORD
I Lack No Thing In Him Adored
He Grants Me Peace, My Soul’s Restored
In Righteous Paths He Leads Me Toward
Life For His Name’s Sake, Christ The LORD
And Though I Walk Through Death Abhorred
I’ll Fear No Wicked, Evil Horde
For You Are With Me, Mercy’s Poured
Like Oil On My Head Reward
I Overflow With Joys Stored
Goodness And Mercy Chase Me Toward
His House Forever Where I’ve Soared
To Heights Of Pleasures In My LORD
All Because God’s Wrath Was Poured
On Christ My Shepherd Who’s Abhorred
Hell’s Anger Pierced Him Like A Sword
He Died And Rose For His Reward
All Praise, All Nations Are Restored
Now My Shepherd’s My Reward
Who Will Forever Be Adored!

More On What It Cost Jesus

It cost Jesus this: The Bible Says God Was Angry With Jesus On The Cross

And this too: The Bible Says The Father Turned His Face Away From Jesus On The Cross

God And The Gospel

To learn more about the great and true Triune God, the God-Man, Jesus Christ, and His glorious Gospel message and everlasting Kingship, please watch American Gospel: Christ Alone. You can watch the full documentary here with a free, 3 day trial.

Resources On Psalm 23

1. Monergism Sermons On Psalm 23

2. Precept Austin On Psalm 23

3. The Sheep And The Shepherd by David Gibson

4. The Traveler And The Companion by David Gibson

5. The Guest And The Host by David Gibson

6. Comfort For All Of Life by Jonathan Gibson

7. 1517 And Chad Bird Podcast On Psalm 23

8. The LORD Of Psalm 23: Jesus Our Shepherd, Companion, And Host by David Gibson

9. A Shepherd Looks At Psalm 23 by Phillip Keller

10. The Pearl Of The Psalms: Spurgeon On Psalm 23, The LORD Is My Shepherd, and The Good Shepherd by Charles Spurgeon