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What Did Jesus Really Mean When He Said Follow Me?

Copyright © 2013 by David Platt. All rights reserved.

This book is adapted from Follow Me: A Call to Die, A Call to Live, copyright 2013 by David Platt.

Designed by Jennifer Ghionzoli

Published in association with Yates & Yates (www.yates2.com).

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version,® NIV.® Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com.

ISBN 978-1-4143-9137-3

ISBN 978-1-4143-8714-7 (SPEC)

ISBN 978-1-4143-9631-6 (ePub); ISBN 978-1-4143-9630-9 (Kindle); ISBN 978-1-4143-9632-3 (Apple)

Build: 2013-10-21 16:27:52

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Great Invitation

Chapter 2: The Great Cost

Chapter 3: The Great Change

Are You Following Jesus?

Introduction

WHEN JESUS WALKED along the shore of the Sea of Galilee, he called to four fishermen, “Come, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Peter, Andrew, James, and John dropped their nets and followed him. Their lives—and indeed, the whole world—were never the same.

But Jesus’ call to follow him was not for them alone. His call has also come to each of us: Will you follow him?

This call to follow Jesus is not one we can easily ignore. It can be tempting in the midst of our busy lives to set it aside, to shrug off the claims that Jesus made, and to go about with business as usual. It can be equally tempting to look at what we see as the failures of those who have claimed Jesus’ name or at our past experiences and assume that we’ve already evaluated all there is to know about Jesus. Been there, done that.

But the nature of Jesus’ claims and his invitation to follow him demand our full attention. Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to [God] the Father except through me.” Peter, one of the four fishermen Jesus called, later said of Jesus, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” Jesus did not claim to be one dish on the buffet line of spirituality from which we can pick and choose the elements that best suit our taste. And if his claims are true, then his call demands everything, and we have no other choice—like those fishermen before us—but to drop everything and follow him.

In this booklet, I aim to set before you what it means to follow Jesus. What is his call? What does it cost? And what does a life of following Jesus entail? These questions deserve careful consideration.

Ultimately the call to follow Jesus is a call to die—to die to ourselves and to die to the things of this world. But at the same time, it is a call to live—to experience unbridled joy as we follow Jesus wherever he leads in this world. The four fishermen knew this, and they gave their lives to follow him.

Have you answered the call?

CHAPTER 1

THE GREAT INVITATION

“FOLLOW ME. . . .”

Jesus’ call to the fishermen seems obvious in that context: they dropped their nets and followed him. They physically walked around with him wherever he went. And after Jesus’ death and resurrection, they followed him by imitating his way of life and spreading the good news about what he had accomplished in his time on earth. But what does it mean for us to follow Jesus today?

First, it means dealing with our most fundamental problem before God. Our problem as people is not simply that we have made some bad decisions in our lives. Our problem is not just that we’ve messed up in this world. Our problem is that we are all—at the very core of our being—rebels against God. This rebellion is what the Bible calls sin, and it keeps us from God.

A perusal through the pages of Scripture shows severe punishment toward sin and sinners alike. Lot’s wife disobeys God by looking back as Sodom and Gomorrah are destroyed and loses her life. God commands the Israelites to do no work on the Sabbath, and a man is put to death for gathering firewood on that holy day. Achan and his family are put to death for keeping plunder that the Lord said should be destroyed. And there are many more examples.

Many people read stories like these in Scripture and walk away confused. After all, as the Bible says elsewhere, isn’t God a God of love? Aren’t these punishments for sin a bit severe? Annihilated for looking backward? Stoned for picking up sticks?

Such questions, though honest, reveal a fundamental problem with our perspective. We naturally view sin through man-centered eyes. We cannot imagine responding this way if the offenses were against us. When people do something we have asked them not to do, we don’t conclude that they should die.

Yet the penalty for sin is not determined by our measure of it. Instead, the penalty for sin is determined by the magnitude of the one sinned against. If you sin against a log, you are not very guilty. On the other hand, if you sin against a man or a woman, then you are absolutely guilty. And ultimately, if you sin against an infinitely holy and eternal God, you are infinitely guilty and worthy of eternal punishment.

Azeem, an Arab follower of Jesus and a friend of mine, was talking recently with a taxi driver in his country. The driver believed that he would pay for his sin for a little while in hell, but then he would surely go to heaven after that. After all, he hadn’t done too many bad things.

So Azeem said to him, “If I slapped you in the face, what would you do to me?”

The driver replied, “I would throw you out of my taxi.”

“If I went up to a random guy on the street and slapped him in the face, what would he do to me?”

“He would probably call his friends and beat you up.”

“What if I went up to a policeman and slapped him in the face? What would he do to me?”

“You would be beat up for sure, and then thrown into jail.”

“And what if I went to the king of this country and slapped him in the face? What would happen to me then?”

The driver looked at Azeem and awkwardly laughed. He told Azeem, “You would die.”

The driver got Azeem’s point and realized that he had been severely underestimating the seriousness of his sin against God.

Dead in Our Sin

Our sin problem is not isolated to one or two instances; it goes to the very core of who we are and makes us utterly unable to turn to God on our own. This is what the Bible means when it says we are dead in sin. When Paul wrote to the Ephesian Christians and said, “You were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live,” he meant that they were completely dead. Not partially dead. Not almost dead. Not halfway dead. Not kind of dead. Completely dead.

So if sin is our problem and we are completely dead because of it, what does that mean? How can we help ourselves or even ask for help? How can people who are dead ask someone else to give them life? When a man’s heart is flatlined, does he invite people to resuscitate him? No. These things are impossible for those who are dead. In your death, you need someone else, completely outside of you, to call you to life and enable you to live.

And that’s exactly what Jesus has done.

Jesus came to live the life we could not live (that is, a life without sin) and to die the death that we, as sinners, deserve to die. We have already seen that even one sin before an infinitely holy and eternal God warrants infinite and eternal punishment. And this is why Jesus came: to endure the holy wrath of God due us as sinners.

My book Radical attracted publicity in a variety of different places. In one news article, a local reporter made the following comment about the book: “While it’s a common pulpit truism that ‘God hates sin but loves the sinner,’ Platt argues that God hates sinners.” Indeed, it was a direct quote from the book, but the article included no context. Concerned church members started asking me, “Pastor, do you believe that God hates sinners?”

This is one of those places where I found myself in a bit of trouble for quoting the Bible. Does God hate sinners? Listen closely to Psalm 5:5-6: “The arrogant cannot stand in your presence; you hate all who do wrong. You destroy those who tell lies; bloodthirsty and deceitful men the LORD abhors.”

And this is not an isolated statement in the Bible. Fourteen times in the first fifty psalms alone we read of God’s hatred toward the sinner, his wrath toward the liar, and so on. In John 3—that chapter where we have one of the most famous verses about God’s love (John 3:16: “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”)—we also have one of the most neglected verses about God’s wrath (John 3:36): “Whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him.”

So all of this raises the question, Is it really true that God hates the sin but loves the sinner? Well, yes, of course, in one sense, but not completely.

Our sin is not something that exists outside of us. Sin is ingrained into the core of our being. We don’t just sin; we exist as sinners. So when Jesus went to the cross to die, he was not just taking the payment of sin, as if it were separate from us. He was not just dying for our lusting or our lying or our cheating or our other sins. Instead, he was paying the price that was due us as sinners. He was dying for us, in our place, as our substitute. In the words of Isaiah 53, “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities . . . and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” When Jesus was pulverized under the weight of God’s wrath on the cross, he was experiencing what you and I deserve to experience. He was enduring the full punishment due you and me as sinners.

The startling reality of Scripture is clear: we are sinners. In the words of Isaiah, “We all, like sheep, have gone astray.” Paul says that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Meanwhile, God is holy, possessing righteous wrath toward sin and sinners alike. Yet God is also merciful, possessing holy love toward sinners. So how can God show both righteous wrath and holy love toward sinners at the same time?

This is the climactic question of the Bible, and the answer is the cross of Christ. At the cross of Christ, God shows the full expression of both his wrath and his love as Jesus is stricken, smitten, afflicted, wounded, crushed, and chastised for the sake of sinners.

Does God hate sinners? Absolutely. Look at the cross. Jesus is enduring the punishment we are due.

But does God love sinners? Absolutely. Look at the cross. Jesus is saving us from the punishment we are due.

This is exactly what Jesus came to do. The Bible announces his coming, saying that “he will save his people from their sins.” When John the Baptist first sees Jesus, John shouts, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

Imagery of God washing away his people’s sin fills Scripture. “Though your sins are like scarlet,” God says, “they shall be as white as snow.” David prays, “Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.” These Bible pictures from the Old Testament provide a foretaste of the forgiveness that ultimately comes through Christ in the New Testament. Speaking to people who used to be characterized by sin-saturated lives, Paul says, “You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Such cleansing is a gift from God not based at all upon our merit but altogether upon God’s mercy. In the words of Paul, “When the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth.” The clear message of the Bible is that there is nothing we can do to make our hearts clean before a holy God. We can work constantly, pray fervently, give extravagantly, and love sacrificially, but our hearts will still be stained by sin.

This is why the Bible teaches that faith alone in Christ alone is the only way to salvation from sin. Faith is the anti-work. It’s the realization that there is nothing you can do but trust in what has been done for you in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Faith is the realization that God’s pleasure in you will never be based upon your performance for him. Instead, God’s pleasure in you will always be based upon Christ’s performance for you.

Repent and Be Saved

So how does a person become a follower of Jesus? How does this salvation become a reality in someone’s life?

The very first word out of Jesus’ mouth in his ministry is clear: repent. It’s the same word that John the Baptist proclaims in preparation for Jesus’ coming. This word is also the foundation for the first Christian sermon in the book of Acts. After Peter proclaims the good news of Christ’s death for sin, the crowds ask him, “What shall we do?” Peter looks them right in their eyes and says, “Repent.”

Repentance is a rich biblical term that signifies an elemental transformation in someone’s mind, heart, and life. When people repent, they turn from walking in one direction to running in the opposite direction. From that point forward, they think differently, believe differently, feel differently, love differently, and live differently.

When Jesus said, “Repent,” he was speaking to people who were rebelling against God in their sin and relying on themselves for their salvation. Jesus’ predominantly Jewish audience believed that their family heritage, social status, knowledge of specific rules, and obedience to certain regulations were sufficient to make them right before God. Jesus’ call to repentance, then, was a summons for them to renounce sin and all dependence on self for salvation. Only by turning from their sin and themselves and toward Jesus could they be saved.

Similarly, when Peter said, “Repent,” he was speaking to crowds who not long before had executed Jesus on the cross. In their sin, they had killed the Son of God and were now standing under the judgment of God. Peter’s call to repentance was a cry for the crowds to confess their wickedness, turn from their ways, and trust in Jesus as Lord and Christ.

Fundamentally, then, repentance involves renouncing a former way of life in favor of a new way of life. So often we assume that the essence of the Christian life is merely being forgiven of our sin (although, again, that is important). Many professing Christians are stuck here, believing that Jesus has cleansed them from their sins, yet lacking true, authentic, real, radical change in their lives.

But this is not the way it’s supposed to be, for there is much more involved in becoming a follower of Jesus. When you come to Jesus, he not only forgives you of your sin, but he also fills you with his Spirit. God has promised his people, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. . . . I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.” The meaning behind these words is mind-blowing. When you come to Jesus, he puts the source of his life in the center of your life.

And this is the heart of Jesus’ call to follow him. When you become a Christian, when you follow Jesus, you die to everything you were before—including the sin that was keeping you from God—and Jesus becomes your life. To paraphrase Paul, “You have died with Christ, and you’re not even alive anymore. Instead, Christ is alive in you, and the only way you live is by faith in him.” Paul later writes, “If Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.”

This is the stunning message of Christianity: Jesus died for you so that he might live in you. Jesus doesn’t merely improve your old nature; he imparts to you an entirely new nature—one that is completely united with his. Everything that belongs to him becomes yours. His righteousness replaces your unrighteousness. His Spirit fills your spirit. His love becomes your love. His joy becomes your joy. His mind becomes your mind. His desires become your desires. His will becomes your will. His purpose becomes your purpose. His power becomes your power. The Christian life thus becomes nothing less than the outliving of the indwelling Christ. This is the essence of what it means to be a Christian—a follower of Christ.

CHAPTER 2

THE GREAT COST

LETTING GO OF SIN and dying to ourselves is costly. When Jesus approached those four fishermen by the sea, he beckoned them to leave behind their professions, possessions, dreams, ambitions, family, friends, safety, and security. He bid them to abandon everything. “If anyone is going to follow me, he must deny himself,” Jesus would say repeatedly. In a world where everything revolves around self—protect yourself, promote yourself, preserve yourself, entertain yourself, comfort yourself, take care of yourself—Jesus said, “Slay yourself.” And that’s exactly what happened. According to the Bible and tradition, these four fishermen paid a steep price for following Jesus. Peter was crucified upside down, Andrew was crucified in Greece, James was beheaded, and John was exiled.

Yet they believed following Jesus was worth the cost. In Jesus, these men found someone worth losing everything for. In Christ, they encountered a love that surpassed comprehension, a satisfaction that superseded circumstances, and a purpose that transcended every other possible pursuit in this world. They eagerly, willingly, and gladly lost their lives in order to know, follow, and proclaim him. In the footsteps of Jesus, these first disciples discovered a path worth giving their lives to tread.

But two thousand years later, I wonder how far we have wandered from this path. Somewhere along the way, amid varying cultural tides and popular trends, many have tried to minimize Jesus’ summons to total abandonment. Churches are filled with people who seem content to have casual association with Christ and give nominal adherence to Christianity. Scores of men, women, and children have been told that becoming a follower of Jesus simply involves acknowledging certain facts or saying certain words. But this is not true. Disciples like Peter, Andrew, James, and John show us that the call to follow Jesus is not simply an invitation to pray a prayer; it is a summons to lose our lives.

Costly Commitment

Why, then, would we think that becoming a Christian means anything less for us? And why would we not want to die to ourselves in order to live in Christ? Yes, there is a cost that accompanies following Jesus Christ, but it is worth it. More aptly put, he is worth it. Jesus is worthy of far more than intellectual belief, and there is so much more to following him than monotonous spirituality. There is indescribable joy to be found, deep satisfaction to be felt, and an eternal purpose to be fulfilled in dying to ourselves and living for him.

But dying is hard. It’s no wonder that so many of us try to avoid the difficult road of following Jesus. In Matthew 7, Jesus exposes our dangerous tendency to gravitate toward that which is easy and popular. Hear his warning: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” In other words, there is a broad road that is inviting and inclusive. This nice, comfortable, ever-so-crowded path is attractive and accommodating. The only thing that’s required of you on this path is a one-time decision for Christ, and you don’t have to worry about his commands, his standards, or his glory after making that decision. You now have a ticket to heaven, and your sin, whether manifested in self-righteousness or self-indulgence, will be tolerated along the way.

But this is not the way of Jesus. He beckons us down a hard road, and the word Jesus uses for this is associated in other parts of the Bible with pain, pressure, tribulation, and persecution. The way of Jesus is hard to follow, and it’s hated by many.

Almost unknowingly, we shrink back from this cost, choosing to redefine Christianity according to our personal preferences, church traditions, and cultural norms. Slowly, subtly, we take the Jesus of the Bible and twist him into someone with whom we are a little more comfortable. We dilute what he says about the cost of following him, we disregard what he says about those who choose not to follow him, we practically ignore what he says about materialism, and we functionally miss what he says about mission. We pick and choose what we like and don’t like from Jesus’ teachings. In the end, we create a nice, non-offensive, politically correct, middle-class, American Jesus who looks just like us and thinks just like us.

But Jesus is not customizable. He has not left himself open to interpretation, adaptation, innovation, or alteration. He has revealed himself clearly through his Word, and we have no right to personalize him. Instead, he revolutionizes us. As we follow Jesus, we believe Jesus, even when his Word confronts (and often contradicts) the deeply held assumptions, beliefs, and convictions of our lives, our families, our friends, our culture, and sometimes even our churches. And such belief in Jesus transforms everything about what we desire and how we live.

Total Transformation

In John 6, Jesus had miraculously fed a crowd of people with one boy’s lunch. Later he declared to the crowds who were craving more bread, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.” In one sweeping statement, Jesus communicated to the crowds that he himself was the provision of God sent to satisfy their souls. Jesus said to the crowds, “If you want to be fulfilled, put your faith in me.”

This declaration carries huge implications for understanding what it means to become and to be a disciple of Jesus. To come to Jesus, or to believe in Jesus, is to look to him to satisfy your soul forever. To come to Jesus is to taste and see that he is good and to find in him the end of all your desires. To believe in Jesus is to experience an eternal pleasure that far outweighs and outlasts the temporal pleasures of this world.

In Christ, our Creator has come to us to satisfy our desires in a way that nothing in this world can ever compare to. Now certainly this doesn’t mean that every pleasure in this world is wrong. God has given us so many things to enjoy in this world. Our taste buds are formed to find pleasure in good food. Our eyes are made to find pleasure in magnificent scenery. Our ears are fashioned to find pleasure in beautiful music. Our bodies are designed to find pleasure in physical intimacy with a spouse.

But amid all these pleasures that we are wired to pursue, we must always remember that our deepest craving is not for something but for Someone. Our ultimate satisfaction is found not in the gifts we enjoy but in the Giver who provides them, “for the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

When we truly come to Christ, our thirst is quenched by the fountain of life and our hunger is filled with the bread of heaven. We discover that Jesus is the supreme source of satisfaction, and we want nothing apart from him. We realize that he is better than all the pleasures, pursuits, plaudits, and possessions of this world combined. As we trust in Christ, he transforms our tastes in such a way that we begin to love the things of God that we once hated, and we begin to hate the things of this world that we once loved.

Consider how this plays out in every disciple’s struggle against sin. Even though the Christian has tasted the goodness of God, the lure of sin is still strong in the world. So how does the disciple of Jesus overcome the promised pleasures of sin? For the new Christian who has struggled with pornography, how does he now fight the lure of enticing images on a computer screen? For the prosperous Christian who has enough money to buy the bigger house and the sleeker car and the nicer clothes and the finer food, how does she resist the temptation to indulge herself while ignoring urgent spiritual and physical needs around her?

Such questions lead us to one of two answers. The more common yet most unsuccessful answer is to try to conquer sin by working hard to change our actions. We often seek to tame our desires with a list of dos and don’ts.

But there is another way, a better way. Instead of trying to conquer sin by working hard to change our actions, we can conquer sin by trusting Christ to change our affections. Remember the words of Jesus in John 6: “He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.” This is how we overcome the pleasures of sin: by letting Christ overcome us with the power of his satisfaction. When lust, lying, greed, possessions, or pornography promise pleasure, we fight their appeal with fulfillment in Christ. We know, believe, and trust that Jesus is better, and we refuse to give in to that sin because we have found greater gratification in our Savior. The way to conquer sin is not by working hard to change our deeds but by trusting Jesus to change our desires.

When Jesus transforms our desires, we realize that the problems we have with sin in this world are not because we want pleasure too much; our problem is that we want pleasure too little. It is tragic when so-called Christians live just like non-Christians, running endlessly after the next temptation, the bigger house, the nicer possession, the newer pursuit, the greater notoriety, the higher success, and the more comfortable lifestyle. Such a quest for pleasure in this world reflects a lack of contentment in Christ. Deep down inside, people seem to be afraid that if they let go of the stuff of this world, they will miss out on satisfaction in this world. But disciples of Jesus gladly leave behind the trinkets this world offers because they have found surpassing treasure in Christ. The passionate pursuit of true, deep, and lasting satisfaction always leads to Jesus.

The more Christ fulfills the cravings of our souls, the more he changes our taste capacities from the inside out. The more we walk with him, the more we want him. The more we taste of him, the more we enjoy him. And this transforms how we live and what we live for.

CHAPTER 3

THE GREAT CHANGE

WHEN WE BECOME followers of Jesus, we make a decided break with our old way of living and take a decisive turn to a new way of life. As Christ begins to live in us, everything begins to change about us. Our minds change. For the first time, we realize who God is, what Jesus has done, and how much we need him. Our desires change. The things of this earth that we once loved we now hate, and the things of God that we once hated we now love. Our wills change. We go wherever Jesus says, we give whatever Jesus commands, and we sacrifice whatever it costs to spend our lives in uncompromising obedience to his Word. Our relationships change. We lay our lives down in love for one another in the church as together we spread the gospel to the world.

Ultimately, our reason for living changes. Possessions and position are no longer our priorities. Comfort and security are no longer our concerns. Safety is no longer our goal because self is no longer our god. We now want God’s glory more than we want our own lives. The more we glorify him, the more we enjoy him, and the more we realize that this is what it means biblically to be a Christian.

Following Jesus doesn’t only change our lives, though. When we answer Jesus’ call to follow him, this changes the way we relate to others around us—both Christians and non-Christians.

Changed Churches

The overflow of following Christ fully is loving the church selflessly. The Bible describes the church as the bride and the body of Christ. Jesus goes so far as to identify the church with himself when he asks Saul on the road to Damascus, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” Saul hadn’t persecuted Christ himself, but he had persecuted Christians, so in essence Jesus was saying, “When you mess with them, you mess with me.”

Yet even Christians often miss the importance of the church. We live in a day when it’s easy, popular, and even preferred for people to remain isolated from one another. So many sit back and say, “Well, what other people do is between them and God. Their sin is their life, their decision, and their responsibility.” But aren’t you glad this isn’t how God responds to us? Aren’t you glad that God pursues us despite our sin and pulls us away from that which destroys us? And don’t we want people in our lives who will love us enough to look out for us when we begin to walk down a road of sinful destruction?

As men and women die to themselves and live in Christ, God brings them together as brothers and sisters in a family of faith. This community of Christians worships with one another regularly, serves one another selflessly, guards one another graciously, gives to one another generously, and cares for one another compassionately. In such community, we find ourselves living to see each other stand firm in the Lord.

This reality is central to understanding the beauty of biblical, Christ-centered community. In the church, followers of Jesus belong to one another and care for one another in such a way that they take responsibility for one another’s good. Being a member of a church means so much more than standing next to someone else and singing some songs once a week. Being a member of a church means realizing that we are responsible for helping the brothers and sisters around us to grow as disciples of Jesus. In the same way, they are responsible for helping us. We desperately need each other in the daily fight to follow Christ in a world that’s full of sin.

As we lay down our lives for one another in the church, we are illustrating God’s love to people in the world. Jesus told his disciples, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” God has said that the world will recognize disciples of Jesus by their distinct love for one another. When Jesus prayed for his followers before he went to the cross, he said to the Father, “I pray . . . that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”

Christians devote themselves to the church because they desire God’s glory in the world. You may be tempted to think, Well, can’t I live for God’s glory on my own? And there’s certainly a sense in which we are intended to display the glory of God in everything we do. But the message of God’s Word is that God’s glory is most majestically displayed not through you or through me, but through us. God raises up the church as a community of Christ-followers and says to all creation, “This is the bride and body of my Son, bought and purchased by his blood, to be my people and receive my power and enjoy my presence and declare my praise forever and ever.”

It is a privilege to be a part of the church. To come to Christ is to become a member of his community. It is biblically, spiritually, and practically impossible to be a disciple of Christ apart from total devotion to a family of Christians.

Changed World

Yet followers of Jesus don’t just love and serve other Christians in the church. They also sacrificially lead people all around the world to experience new life in Christ. When Jesus called the first disciples, he told those four fishermen, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Using imagery familiar to these disciples’ long-standing vocation, Jesus summoned them to an all-consuming mission right from the start. More important than searching for fish all over the sea, they would spread the gospel all over the world. As a result of being disciples of Jesus, they would make disciples of Jesus. For every one of these disciples, following Jesus would lead to fishing for men. Not surprisingly, the book of Matthew ends with Jesus on a mountainside, saying to these same disciples, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Between Matthew 4 and Matthew 28, Jesus transformed these followers into a new kind of fishermen, and by the time they got to that mountain in Matthew 28, they were eager to tell everyone about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Having been forgiven of their sin and soon to be filled with God’s Spirit, they would give their lives not simply to being disciples of Jesus, but sacrificially to making disciples of Jesus.

The overflow of transformation in these disciples was multiplication through these disciples. As Jesus transformed their minds, they became convicted that people needed to hear the gospel. As Jesus transformed their desires, they longed for people to hear the gospel. As Jesus transformed their wills, they were compelled to give their lives proclaiming the gospel. As Jesus transformed their relationships, they loved people enough to share the gospel with them, even though it cost them everything they had. Jesus had transformed their very purpose for living—every disciple was sacrificially committed to making disciples—and the trajectory of their lives was never the same.

Disciples of Jesus can’t help but to make disciples of all nations. When we truly believe Jesus’ words and know Jesus’ worth, then we are compelled to obey his commission. We don’t make disciples because we are forced to or because we’re guilted into doing so. We make disciples among all peoples and among the toughest of places because we long to see more and more people know Jesus. Our thirst has been eternally quenched by the infinite goodness, greatness, grace, mercy, majesty, strength, and sufficiency of God in Christ, and so we excitedly and eagerly tell all who are thirsty where they can be satisfied. Making disciples of Jesus is the overflow of delight in being a disciple of Jesus.

So what does it mean to make disciples? Well, it starts with leading people to trust in Christ for salvation. We verbally share the good news of God’s grace and invite people to respond to Jesus’ saving, all-satisfying call.

But that’s not where disciple making stops. Disciple making also involves showing people what the life of Christ looks like in action. People around us long to see a demonstration of Christ that accompanies our explanation of Christ. In our homes and our workplaces; in our families and with our friends; as husbands, wives, moms, dads, sons, daughters, employers, employees, teachers, coaches, lawyers, doctors, janitors, consultants, waiters, salespeople, and accountants, you and I intentionally lead lives that imitate Christ. As we model the character of Christ, speak the truth of Christ, and show the love of Christ, we commend the life of Christ to people all around us in the process of disciple making.

Disciple making also involves teaching people to obey all that Christ has commanded us. Now some might say, “Isn’t that what preachers are supposed to do?” And in one sense, the answer to this question is yes. God has clearly called and gifted some people in the church to teach his Word formally. At the same time, he has commanded every follower of Jesus to teach his Word relationally.

Jesus tells all of his disciples to go, baptize, and teach people to obey everything he has commanded them. This kind of teaching doesn’t require a special gifting or a specific setting. This kind of teaching happens all over the place—in homes, neighborhoods, workplaces, on car rides, in meetings, and over meals—in the context of where we live, work, and play every day. Consider the picture God gives in Deuteronomy 6, instructing parents concerning his words: “Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” This is the picture of Christ’s church that we see in Scripture: a community of faith saturating their conversations with the Word of God wherever they go—in their homes, where they work, and wherever else they walk.

To be a disciple of Jesus is to make disciples of Jesus. This has been true ever since the first century when Jesus first invited four men to follow him, and God’s design for twenty-first-century disciples is exactly the same. Jesus calls every one of his disciples to make disciples who make disciples until the gospel penetrates every group of people in the world.

Are You Following Jesus?

IF YOU’VE READ THIS BOOKLET and are wondering how you can follow Jesus, the first reality to recognize is that apart from God’s grace toward you in Christ, there is no way you could ever save yourself. Each of us has a sin problem. The Bible says that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” But the Bible also says that “if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” Jesus has lived the life you could not live, died the death you deserve to die, and conquered the enemy (sin and death) you cannot conquer.

Let me bring home the question in this way. If you knew without a doubt that at a specific time and date you were going to die and stand before God, the obvious question you would face is this: Am I secure in Christ, and will I be welcomed into eternity with him? Is it possible to be sure?

The biblical answer is yes, it’s possible. When we understand and admit our sinfulness and inability to satisfy the standard of God’s holiness, we have no option but to appeal to Christ for his mercy. We can’t count on anything else—not our own goodness or hard work or good intentions. Our only hope is in Christ alone. And being a disciple of Christ manifests itself in a life of sharing that same hope with others so that they, too, become committed disciples.

So in light of God’s love for you and Christ’s work on your behalf, I encourage you as you read this to turn from your sin and yourself and to trust in Jesus as Savior and Lord. There are no prescribed words that you must pray. Confess your need for Jesus and surrender your life to him. As I mentioned in chapter 1, biblical repentance is a total reorientation of your life around trusting Jesus.

But don’t stop there. Following Jesus is not a one-time prayer: it is a lifelong journey. As we’ve seen, following Jesus is also not something we do in isolation. So find a church with whom you can live out your commitment to Christ. Someone—a friend, a coworker, or a member of a local church—may have passed this booklet along to you. If that’s the case, you may want to ask that person about the body of believers of which they are a part. It is biblically, spiritually, and practically impossible to be a disciple of Christ apart from total devotion to a family of Christians. So find a group of other believers who will help you (and whom you can help) as you follow Jesus.

And as you begin new life as a disciple of Jesus, begin giving your life to making disciples of Jesus. As we’ve seen, following Christ inevitably leads to fishing for men. Being a disciple creates an insatiable desire to make disciples. So now that you have found new life in Jesus, who around you needs to hear about him? And how can you give your life (praying, giving, and going) to the spread of the gospel around the world?

The cost of following Christ is great, for it costs you everything you are. But the reward of following Christ is greater, for you experience everything he is—both now and forever.

The What Did Jesus Really Mean When He Said Follow Me? booklet is available exclusively from

Tyndale’s Ministry Department.

Contact

Heather Alred

(heatheralred@tyndale.com; 630-784-5478)

or

Charlie Swaney

(charlieswaney@tyndale.com; 630-784-5270) for ordering information.