To Be A Disciple

Luke 14:33 - In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.

This is a verse I have never heard preached on in any church. I have heard taught "How to get everything that is yours in Jesus", "How to claim your rights in Jesus", "How to receive God's promises", but I have never heard this verse expounded on in any church. Today's doctrines are all about how to get what we want from God, not about how we need to be obeying God's commands. Luke 14:33 is one of His commands many of you will have to obey in the near future.

Giving up everything I had is something the Lord has required me to do twice in the past 28 years, in 1984 and in 2005. Was it something I wanted to do? Heck no!! But it was what the Lord required of me. Even now, everything I own will fit in the front seat of my truck. Am I happy about it? Absolutely not! All the precious memories, all the pictures, all the letters, all the mementos, everything that was dear to me I had to give up. Do I miss those things? Yes, I do. Did it hurt to lose them? Yes. But I have learned to be content (not happy, but content) without all those things.

In the near future many of you will be required to leave virtually everything behind when you have to flee the cities before God's judgment falls upon them. Many of you will have to flee in the face of persecution and to avoid death when the foreign armies are occupying this nation and indiscriminately killing people. Some of you along the Gulf Coast will have to flee before the destruction that is almost upon that part of the country. You will have to leave behind all your precious treasures and just take the bare essentials with you. I am telling you this ahead of time so that you can begin to ponder these things and mentally and spiritually prepare yourselves to be able to leave everything behind. If you truly want to be His disciple, you will have to give up everything. If you do not, you will be so burdened down that you will never make it to the places of refuge.