Do you know there are people who claim to be a Christian but in actuality they have just enough religion to make themselves miserable? Oh, they pray at mealtime (sometimes), they’ll go to church once or twice a month (when there’s no coronavirus) to flip God a couple of coins of commitment so they can get their name checked off on the imaginary attendance chart in heaven. If they are asked if they are a Christian they’ll say, “Of course – I believe in Jesus”. They know they should get off the fence and go “ALL IN” and follow Jesus. The problem is they’ve let the devil hold them back from being totally committed to following Jesus.

There are so many passages that address what it actually/factually means to believe in Jesus and be saved. All or nothing – with Him or against Him. We do NOT earn salvation by having the right amount of commitment – it’s faith, but what is “faith” and what kind of faith? “And He summoned the crowd together with His disciples, and said to them, ‘If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what does it benefit a person to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul? For what could a person give in exchange for his soul. For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of him when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels’” (Mk. 8:34-38).

Read Luke 14:25-33. Then listen to All in by Matthew West. See you Sunday for worship at the church building or online @ jesus-place.org.

Luke 14:25-33

Now large crowds were going along with Him, and He turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost, to see if he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who are watching it will begin to ridicule him, saying, ‘This person began to build, and was not able to finish!’ Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to face the one coming against him with twenty thousand? Otherwise, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and requests terms of peace. So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.