The Process of Discipleship Part 1 | Wednesday Night Service

Man, I'm excited to be able to do this. So thanks, Pastor Steph, for giving me the opportunity. There's been a theme that's been on my heart for some time now, and it's really something that we talk about quite a bit here at the Refuge. It's something that's very much a part of our DNA and who we are. And it's been on my heart specifically.

And I want to talk about it for a little bit, kind of informal, if you will.

Just some thoughts that I have on it and some stuff that I feel like the Lord has shown me in Scripture.

But tonight I want to talk about the process of discipleship and when I read Scripture, kind of what I see and what I think it looks like. And I pray that the Lord would speak through me tonight. But this will be a little bit informal. I just kind of want to share some of my thoughts on this stuff and what I feel like the Lord is showing me and how the Lord's been dealing with me personally in this. So when I was in my late teens and early twenties, I graduated from high school at seventeen and actually very quickly was on my own, moved out of the house at 17.

Nothing wrong between me and my parents. I was going to about to start school full time at a local community college, and I was working full time at Walmart, and my dad was taking a job. We lived in Tennessee. My dad was taking a job, believe it or not, in North Carolina. So he was moving here, and I was already.

Already enrolled. So I set out on my own.

But when I was working for Walmart at the time, a few years into it, one of the store managers that I had the privilege to work under, he said something that's stuck with me all these years. I've never forgot it. I had just transferred to a new store, and they needed something done, and they were trying to find someone that knew how to do it. Well, I knew how to do it, so I said, hey, I'll take care of that for you. And the store manager apparently signed for me to transfer to the store.

Without knowing my experience with the company or my background or what have you. He goes, you know how to do this? And I said, yeah, I was such and such at the store that I came from. And he's like, then, yeah, you know how to do this? And he goes, can I tell you something?

I said, sure. He goes, you see those guys right over there? And he pointed to some associates. He said, those guys have been here for like 10 years plus, and they don't know how to do this. He's like, I'm going to tell you something and don't forget it.

He goes, they're what I call 10 to 1 Associates. They have been here for 10 years, but they have one year experience because they keep repeating the same year over and over and over and over again. And. And he goes, who knows whether or not they'll ever get out of that rut? And that's just kind of stuck with me in life and stuck with me in terms of my relationship with the Lord.

Because right now in the church at large and even here at the refuge for some people, in some degree and to some degree in every one of our individual lives, we can be stuck in a rut and living the same year in Christ over and over and over and over again without really rising in maturity or experience in the Lord.

And that's kind of stuck with me. And listen, the Lord's been convicting me about that in certain parts of my life. Like there's this expectation of more, but it's not condemnation, right? It's a calling higher.

Right? There's that knowing in my heart that the Lord has more than what I'm currently experiencing in my life.

And this has been a theme on my heart here lately. So I just kind of wanted to be open with you guys and share with you guys, if that's okay. If you will, turn to Luke chapter nine.

And like I said, I want to talk about the process of discipleship because I think sometimes we get stuck repeating the same experience and same year over and over again in the Lord and the Lord's. I believe he's offering this opportunity for us to come out of that tonight and to move forward in the process of discipleship. And listen, this is in no way any, any type of condemnation or anything. This is just the Lord calling us higher than. This is me telling you the Lord is calling Jonathan Daniel higher.

But I think it's a call for all of us. So Luke 9. Let's look at verse 57 or 51.

So this is just a short background. When I read Luke 9 or the Book of Luke, chapter nine kind of seems like a turning point for Jesus. I don't know exactly where in the timeline this particular chapter falls in terms of Jesus was, you know, in his earthly ministry for three years. And I don't know where this falls in that timeline. Sorry, um, but this seems to be a turning point for Jesus.

Um, and it's, it's kind of amazing what happens after this point. Verse 51 says at the time, as the time drew near for him to ascend into heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem, right? So he's been going this entire time in his ministry. And now it's like the Lord's calling him right towards his place of ultimate surrender to the Lord.

And he's resolved inside of him that he is going. So keep that in mind as we read this. Let's skip down to verse 57. As they were walking, talking about Jesus and his disciples. Now where are they going?

To Jerusalem. Right? They're walking to the place of surrender. This is interesting. Here's what happens.

As they were walking along, someone said to Jesus, I will follow you wherever you go. And Jesus replied, foxes have dens to live in and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head. And Jesus said to another person, come, follow me. The man agreed. But he said, lord, first let me return home and bury my father.

Jesus told him, let the spiritually dead hurry bury their own dead. Your duty is to go and preach about the Kingdom of God. Another said, yes, Lord, I will follow you, but first let me say goodbye to my family. But Jesus told him, anyone who puts his hand to the plow and then looks back is not fit for the kingdom of God.

So the first thing in the process of discipleship, I've got some words that begin with the letter P, so bear with me. I tried to make it at least rememberable. When you leave here, you'll remember something. I said the letter P. So the first one is personal, right? Discipleship is personal.

Over the last two weeks, Pastor Abe and Gracie Denton actually taught the first P of my message. So this is step two, or sermon two, or whatever you want to call it in the series. All right. I feel like before the Lord, he orchestrated this. But they talked about letting Jesus get personal with you, right?

His desire for every person, especially those who he's calling to be disciples, is to let him be personal in your life. And that's what he does right here with these guys. He points out the one thing that's going to keep them from surrendering to him as a disciple, from following him. He gets personal with them. And Jesus works like that.

I think this is one of the biggest things that trips us up in being disciples of Christ is we refuse to let Jesus have certain parts of who we are, Right? And if we can't get this first thing done, and I'm not going to rehash the whole thing, because I think they did a Much better job at it than I could have.

But we have to let both Jesus and others get personal with us to help knock the things out of us. That's going to keep us from growing in the Lord. That's going to keep us from. From having to repeat that same year of experience over and over and over and over again where we're stuck in this rut, right? And the.

The plans that the Lord has laid out for us before he laid the foundation of this earth never come to fruition. If the devil can keep us in that spot, if he can keep us repeating the same thing over and over again, it could be showing up for church every Sunday morning.

But that's the extent of your relationship with the Lord.

And you repeat that over and over and over and over again for 10, 15, 20 years. And the devil renders us ineffective for the kingdom because we don't grow in our discipleship with the Lord.

So, quick story.

Sunday night, I went out with a friend of mine. He actually is here tonight. We went out and had some dinner and spent some time together just as brothers in the Lord and had a good time. And when I got home, I was walking up the driveway, and if you our house, you can see all the way to the backyard from the side yard. And I looked in the backyard and I saw movement back there.

And I'm like, what is that? So I went over to the side yard and I looked. I kid you not. This is a true story. My wife is walking through the backyard like this, And I'm like, what in the world is she doing?

So, being a good husband, I didn't want to interrupt her. So I just watched her and I thought, what in the world is she doing? And I looked, and she had one of my son's Airsoft guns in her hands. And I'm like. So after a while, I, like, curiosity got the best of me.

I'm like, babe, what are you doing? She's like, I'm chasing rabbits.

So if you're my age or older, right, that's like Elmer Fudd all the way, right? You see him in those little cartoons. He's like, I'm gonna get these weskerly rabbits.

So.

And then, like, I see something move in the grass. And then I heard her yell for my son. And she's like. She's like, jace, get the rifle. So Jace comes running out the back door, lifts the gun, and pops this rabbit on the move in the backyard.

All right, well, Jason, I. We shoot. I've taught him how to shoot guns. He knows how to handle one. But he pops this rabbit on the move.

I mean, it's running, and he falls. He follows it, leads with. Shoots the rabbit, right? So, like, you know, they're celebrating the victory and everything.

So we get in, and we're sitting down to dinner, and. And I'm like, so, what are you doing? She's like, well, the rabbits keep messing with my garden, right? They're destroying my fruit.

And I said, okay. And she goes, well, listen to this, guys. This is a true story. You're gonna think I'm lying to you, but this is a true story. She starts telling me this story about how she was out there earlier in the day and she chased this baby rabbit into the bushes.

So she's over there, you know, trying to scare it out of the bushes. So she scares this baby rabbit out of the bushes, and when she does, it starts running across the yard. And as it starts running, this hawk scoops down and jerks that rabbit up and starts flying away with it. And the rabbit's screaming, right? It's yelling because it does not want to go.

And then the mama rabbit hears the baby screaming and like any mama would, comes running out after it. And when it does, she shoots the mama.

True story.

It's not over yet. There's more.

So Monday night, we're sitting at dinner, I get home from work, we're eating, and she's telling me how bad she feels about the baby rabbit. And she can remember the screams.

And then she shot the mama rabbit. And we get done with dinner, and we clean up, and I'm like, well, I'm going to go upstairs, take a shower, get, you know, get ready for the evening. And if our bedroom's on the back of our house, right, so I can see out to the backyard. Well, on my way up the stairs, I hear the back door open, right? And I look out the back window, and this is what I see.

She's out there again. After telling me how bad she feels about getting the baby rabbit eaten by a hawk and then shooting the mama rabbit when she comes out to defend her baby, she's out there again pulling the Elmer foot, right? She's hunting rabbits.

But you know what? Listen, we need someone who will hunt the rabbits in our life, right? I was trying to figure out some way to tie this into the sermon, and I think I've got it.

So if you have rabbits in your life that is destroying your fruit, call my wife. She'll bring the hawk and the gun, and she'll get rid of them for you. But we need someone. We need to let people get that personal with us, right? People that are willing to knock the things out of us that keep our fruit from growing, right?

The little things, it's the little foxes that spoil the vine. And if we don't let people in our life close enough to us to be able to see the foxes and get rid of them, then we repeat the cycle over and over and over again in our lives and we become 10 to 1 Christians. We have all these years logged under our belt at the church, but one year of experience in the Lord, right? And that's not who we want to be. And for some of us, right, it's not just.

It's not our whole life that is like that. It might be areas of our life, right, where we keep repeating the same thing over and over and over again. And the Lord's really been dealing with me about taking some practical steps, right? So the areas in my life that are just. They may not even be bad, they're just not fruitful, right?

To let him pinpoint those things and get them out of my life. And if we will do that, that will strengthen us and give us the ability for the second P which is predictable or unpredictable because the life of a disciple is unpredictable.

And that all boils down to faith and obedience. You see, when we let the Lord deal with us, the things in our lives, it builds our faith because we see he has the power to do it in us. So it gives us faith to believe he can do it in others. So we'll obey him when he tells us to go to others.

One of the biggest reasons for our lack of faith and our lack of obedience is because we don't do number one, right? We don't let people get personal with us. We don't let the Lord get personal with us and knock those things out. So we don't have the experience to be able to tell someone, yes, the Lord can do this for you. So we don't have the faith for it, right?

And we don't have the faith to obey in it.

So I want to read some scripture real quick and then we'll move on. But Hebrews 11, a lot of you guys will know this scripture.

This is one of my favorite passages of Scripture, but I'm going to start with verse six. It says it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek Him. It was by faith that Noah built a large boat to Save his family from the flood. He obeyed God who warned him about things that had never happened before.

Right? Being a disciple is unpredictable, Right? It's a matter of faith and obedience in the Lord without knowing what's going to happen next. That's what disciples do.

It was by faith that Abraham obeyed when God called him to leave home and go to another land. It was by faith that even Sarah. I'm skipping some scripture. So. It was by faith that even Sarah was able to have a child, though she was barren and was too old.

It was by faith that Abraham offered Isaac as a sacrifice, Isaac being his son when God was testing him. It was by faith that Isaac promised blessings for the future to his sons Jacob and Esau. It was by faith that Joseph, when he was about to die, said confidently that the people of Israel would leave Egypt. It was by faith that Moses parents hid him for three months when he was born. It was by faith that Moses, when he grew up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

And he chose to share the oppression of God's people instead of joining the fleeting pleasures of sin. It was by faith that people of Israel went right through the Red Sea as though they were on dry ground. It was by faith that the people of Israel marched around Jericho for seven days and walls came crashing down. It was by faith that Rahab the prostitute was not destroyed with the people in her city who refused to obey God. Verse 32.

How much more do I need to say? It would take too long to recount the stories of the faith of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Japheth, David, Samuel and all the prophets. By faith, these people overthrew kingdoms, ruled with justice, and received what God had promised them. They shut the mouths of lions, quenched the flames of fire, and escaped death by the edge of the sword. Their weakness was turned to strength.

They became strong in battle and put whole armies to flight. Women received their loved ones back again from death. But others were tortured, refusing to turn from God in order to be set free. They placed their hope in a better life after the resurrection.

My eyes are tearing up. I'm sorry and I can't read. Give me just a second. Some were jeered at and their backs were cut open with whips. Others were claimed in prison or chained in prisons.

Some died by stoning. Some were sawed in half and others were killed with a sword. Some went about wearing skins of sheep and goats. Destitute and oppressed and mistreated, they were too good for this world. Wandering over deserts and mountains, hiding in Caves and holes in the ground.

All these people earned a good reputation because of their faith. Yet none of them received all that God had promised. For God had something better in mind for us so that they would not reach perfection without us.

You see, life is often unpredictable. And if we're going to follow life or follow God in this life, our lives are going to be somewhat unpredictable. We've got to have both the faith and the obedience, right, to reach out for what God truly has for us.

Luke 6:46. Jesus asks this question. He says, why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I say, right? And I believe it's. It's an honest question that the Lord is asking them.

Listen, why do you do this? In other words, what keeps you from obeying me? Even though you call me Lord, even though you claim me as Lord, what is it that keeps you from obeying me? And it all goes back to the first one.

And I believe the Lord is calling us tonight, right? To let him in in the places that he needs to come in, clean us up, so that we have the faith to obey him. Because he has good things in store for us. It's a promise. It's written in His Word.

It's not empty. He has very good things in store for us. And I feel like the Lord is calling us to that as a. As a body, as a family tonight. That's what he's pressing on our hearts.

Number three. Power. Disciples walk in power, Man. I was trying to pick a scripture for this, but I would just have to tell you to read the whole New Testament in order to.

There's so many examples, but I was reading through the Book of Acts the other day and just. Can you guys indulge me for a moment? I just made a somewhat short list compared to what's in there, but this is what disciples do. This is the power that they have.

Disciples, they learn about the kingdom. They receive the promises of the Father. They walk in power. They tell others about Jesus. They meet regularly with other disciples.

Disciples realize both the need and effect of prayer. Disciples develop other disciples. Disciples meet with other believers. Some of these may be a repeat. I'm sorry.

Disciples possess the wisdom to explain the acts of the Lord. This is all found in the Book of Acts. Disciples memorize and draw wisdom from Scripture. Disciples have wisdom to know what to do and call others to repentance. Disciples baptize others.

Disciples are lied about. They're arrested. They meet opposition. They disrupt religious beliefs. They speak with wisdom.

They speak truth. No matter the Cost. Even if they're persecuted, they preach the gospel to unbelievers. They obey the Lord in the midst of danger. They are themselves discipled.

They heal the sick. They raise the dead. They travel great distances for the sake of the gospel. They don't confuse culture with truth.

That's something that the church struggles with.

I mean, I've heard it preached from pulpits, televangelists. I hate to even call them that, Man. There's so much culture mingled in with the preaching of Scripture that the church has a hard time recognizing the truth of the gospel because it's mingled, right? And it's done very well who people have. By people who have incredible gifts to speak.

They're sly with their tongue. And they mix these things in to justify both what they're doing and what their church is doing so they don't lose people out of their pews, Right? If the blind lead the blind, they will both fall in a ditch.

But that's what's happening. Disciples have the ability to distinguish between truth and culture, and they choose to live the truth. It's not popular. It doesn't gain you accolades, I can promise you that. But it's worth it.

It's worth it.

Disciples seek the help of other disciples. They seek out the people others reject. They strengthen believers. They correct false teaching. They're thrown in prison.

They receive others into their homes. They earn money with their own hands. And they're generous. They're open to learning and instruction. They baptize people in the spirit.

They challenge demonic and oppressive spirits. And. And they give and receive instruction. The list can go on and on. But how do we get the power to live that type of life?

We surrender ourselves to the process of discipleship, right? Because this process is not a step where once you hit that step, you never have to deal with it again. No, this is a process repeated over and over. You see, we're going to repeat something. We can repeat one year of experience even though we've been around for 20 years, or we can repeat this process and continually grow.

That means we live open to the correction of others. We live open to the correction of the Lord. We let other people speak into our lives, just like the disciples let the Lord speak in to theirs.

You see? And if we ever, ever eliminate one step of this process, we will fall in every step of the process.

And a lot of times I know for certain in my life, right? You've got to really, really surrender yourself to the Lord to be able to know where he's at in your Life.

To be able to know what he's calling you to. To be able to understand the next step. Whether the next step is just to wait before the Lord or it's to take action.

We've got to surrender ourselves to the Lord. When I was in high school, I remember, I won't mention what denomination it was. Some of you will figure it out by the story.

But there was this very large church, like you could see from our high school campus in Tennessee. You could see it from the campus. And, man, I really, really liked. I met the youth pastor there. I didn't go to the church, but I met the youth pastor.

He's a really good guy.

But people that went to that church, I would hear them be talking to each other in school and they would say, so and so went down yesterday morning or last night and made a commitment to the Lord.

And man, less than a week later, I was wondering what happened to the commitment, right?

And I've often wondered that through the years, you know? And then it hit me one day that Jesus is not looking for our commitment. He's not looking for commitment from the human will. He's looking for the surrender from the human heart is what he's looking for. Every one of us has broken commitments, right?

But out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

And when our heart is surrendered to Jesus, our mouth will speak. Jesus. We will have the grace of Isaiah 50. I will open your ears morning by morning, and you will listen as one being taught. And I will give you the tongue of a disciple, a disciplined follower of Jesus.

This is how we get that discipline in our lives.

We submit ourselves to him, we become obedient, and then we walk in power. That's a disciplined follower of Jesus.

It's Isaiah's prophecy in chapter 50 about Jesus himself, the one that we're supposed to follow after, the one that we're supposed to model our lives after. That was Isaiah's prophecy about who this man was. And that's what he's been calling me to. That's where he's been leading my heart. And as a brother in the Lord, I just wanted to share this with you because I really feel like that's the Lord's heart for us tonight, and that's what he's calling us to.

One more and we will be done early. All right, the fourth and final P word is Pete or repeat.

What are you laughing at?

All right, and we're going to look at Peter, see what I did there as an example. So let's turn to John 21, if you will.

This is a perfect example of reliving this process of discipleship over and over and over again. We all know, right? If you've read the New Testament, we all know that Jesus called Peter to be a disciple, right? It is clear. There's.

There's no ambiguity in it. And we all know that when he did, he spoke the words, follow me, right? That was his clarion call to those he called to be disciples. He said, listen, follow me.

And here's where we have to repeat the process over and over again to stay effective as a disciple of the Lord.

Chapter 21. Let's start in verse 15. So let me set this story up real quick.

So Jesus had already been crucified on the cross. He's risen from the dead. And in between the time he rises from the dead and he ascends back up into heaven. Thank God for the ascension.

But between that time, he appears to his disciples a few times. This is one of them. And listen to this verse 15.

After breakfast, Jesus asked, simon Peter, Jesus is getting personal with Peter.

He says, simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?

Yes, Lord. Peter replied, you know I love you. And Jesus told him, feed my lambs. Jesus repeated the question, simon, son of John, do you love me? He's getting very personal with Peter.

Yes, Lord. Peter said, you know I love you. Then take care of my sheep. Jesus said a third time, he asked him, simon, son of John, do you love me? He got so personal that Peter was now hurt.

Peter was hurt that Jesus asked the question a third time. He said, lord, you know everything.

You know that I love you. Jesus said, then feed my sheep.

I tell you the truth. When you were young, here's that unpredictable part about discipleship. You were able to do as you liked. You dressed yourself and went wherever you wanted to go. But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands and others will dress you and take you.

Where do you do not want to go. Jesus said this to let him know by what kind of death he would glorify God. Then Jesus told him, follow me. And now we find ourselves back at the first step of the process.

Peter's repeating the process.

It's a process of maturity. It's a process of growth that leads to lives of power in the Lord.

I heard someone say something the other day, somebody I work with. He said, you know what? I'm much more impressed by people who stick with things that they're not necessarily good at until they finish than someone who just repeats the same thing over and over again that he's really good at.

I'm like, that's kind of profound, right? Because Jesus is always calling us into stuff that we can't handle on our own. We've got to have him, right?

I was trying to think of something I'm good at, but I can't.

Baby, never mind.

Don't go there after I told that story.

But yes, I mean, I could keep. Okay, construction. I'm decent at that, right? I can keep going building the same exact house over and over and over and over and over again. Because that's what I do.

I'm a builder, right? And I will never progress in my ability to work in construction. I will just repeat the same thing with the same measurements, the same floor plan, everything, until I have it memorized. But I will never, ever grow my knowledge and wisdom in that area.

But hand me a set of blueprints I've never seen before, and I have to tackle that job now. The growth starts right now. I'm taken out of my comfort zone and this maturing process begins. And listen, Jesus takes us out of the familiar, right? He takes us to places we're not comfortable with.

And it's our job to surrender and to believe and have faith and lean on him in the process, right? If we leave when things get uncomfortable, we lose maturity. We lose the opportunity to. To mature in the Lord.

So that I pray the Lord would strengthen us tonight.

He would strengthen us in our inner man to know how deep and wide his love is for us, so that we would have the faith to obey him when he calls us to step forward.

As I was. I'm going to end. We're going to pray, but in an act of obedience to the Lord. As I was praying over the last few days for this, I really felt there was going to be someone here who has had these thoughts run through their mind and maybe even said it out loud to themselves. If the Lord knows everything I've done, He would never let me be a disciple.

That's for someone.

And I've been praying for you.

But listen to me. He already knows.

And the call is still there. The desire in his heart for you to be a disciple is still there.

And I want to challenge you. Could be more than one, but I know there's one. Listen. Go read John chapter four.

It tells the story of a Samaritan woman at the well.

One of the foundational truths in that story is that Jesus knew everything about that woman, yet he did not leave. He called her to Follow him in spite of everything she had done. And he knew it, every bit of it. In fact, when she asked him to give her water so that she would never thirst again, the first thing he did was get personal with her. He said, go call your husband.

She's like, I don't have one. He's like, I know. And then begin to tell her about all the men she had lived with in the past.

He began to get personal and listen. To her credit, she let him do it.

And then she ended up bringing an entire village to the Lord because she gained faith by seeing what the Lord could do for her.

So she ran off and told the whole village, hey, listen, come see a man who's told me everything I've ever done. The implication was, every other man that knew what she had done, they left. This one was still here. They wanted to know about that man.

And I'm telling you tonight, whoever that is, he knows. And he's still calling you to be a disciple. He wants to get personally involved in your life. He wants to clean you up and set you free. I feel that before the Lord, you're here tonight.

I know it. I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand, but feel free to find. If it's a lady, find my wife, find one of the other female pastors. If it's a man, come find myself. I will pray with you.

Find one of our elders, find one of our deacons and go get with them. Let them help you through that process. Because the Lord has good things in store for you. In fact, there's a dream you thought about today. The Lord wants to give that to you, but you've got to surrender to this process.

So let's stand. Let's just pray we're done a few minutes early. Thank you for letting me share my heart tonight.

But listen, I'll be completely honest with you. I don't really know where to go from here.

Other than. Listen, why don't you take some time and just in a personal way, right? Just surrender yourself to the Lord, fresh and new, and let's see what the Lord does, right? If there's sin you need to repent for, confess it to the Lord. Repent for the sin.

If there's little things, little attitudes or whatever the case may be that the Lord's been dealing with you about, then let him deal with it. Let him push those things out of you. If you need some help with it. There's no shame in getting help. None whatsoever.

I don't know a mature person in the Lord who doesn't get help, because if they don't, they refuse to by default. They're not mature.

So listen, let him deal with it. He wants to take us to that point of faith and obedience so that our lives are marked with power. Because that's what this world needs. This world needs people who know Jesus and know how to take him into the situations that they're living in, the messes that they've built in their lives.

The world needs people like that, and there's a room full of them standing here.