Luke 14:31-35

“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 oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. In the same way, those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.

“Therefore, salt is good; but if even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned? It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile; it is thrown out.

“Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”


Jesus continues his discourse to the crowd, having instructed them that being his disciple requires loving God more than family, friend, or even one's own life. It requires a willingness to suffer anything - even torture, ridicule, or death. Anyone considering becoming his disciple should consider this before beginning. As a man who begins a tower and does not complete it would be shamed by the community and mocked by a half built monument to his lack of planning, so is one who begins to follow Jesus and does not finish.

Consider the cost. A king would be foolish not to assess the strength of the other army before going into battle. He would estimate the possible cost to his treasure reserve and the lives of his men. If he knows he will lose, he will be willing to compromise and give up money or freedom to avoid annihilation. Anyone desiring to be Jesus' disciple must consider whether he is willing to lose possessions, suffer injury, and even lose his life in the battle. Of course, without becoming his disciple there can be no lasting terms of peace.

Salt has been a valuable preservative since ancient times. It certainly adds flavor, but in the days before refrigeration, salt was one of the best ways to keep meat from turning rancid. In Leviticus 2, God's instructions about bringing offerings included salt. Salt was symbolic of loyalty to the covenant of God, preserving the relationship between God and man. Salt from the Dead Sea contained a gypsum compound that could diminish the effectiveness of salt if not processed correctly. It would lose its taste and become ineffective as a preservative. It could no longer be considered salt. Useless, it would not even be good enough for the compost heap.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught that his followers should be salt, so here he clearly refers to those calling themselves his followers. True followers retain their flavor and usefulness. Others may begin with the appearance of saltiness but over time lose their "saltiness". We can seem on the exterior like "salty" believers with all the appearance of holiness. We can focus on doing all the right things without being transformed on the inside. But as the gypsum in the Dead Sea compound eventually degraded the salt to the point that it could not be considered salt, so outward religiosity will eventually show itself to be false. Only the transforming power of the Holy Spirit can truly change our lives.

"The Christian landscape is strewn with the wreckage of derelict, half-built towers, the ruins of those who began to build and were unable to finish. For thousands of people still ignore Christ's warning and undertake to follow Him without first pausing to reflect on the cost of doing so. This is the great scandal of Christendom today, so-called nominal Christianity. In countries to which the Christian civilization has spread, large numbers of people have covered themselves with a decent, but thin veneer of Christianity. They've allowed themselves to become somewhat involved, enough to be respectable, but not enough to be uncomfortable. Their religion, is a great soft cushion. It protects them from the hard unpleasantness of life while changing its place and shape to suit their convenience. No wonder the cynics speak of hypocrites in the church and dismiss religion as escapism."

John Stott - Basic Christianity

Luke 14:25-30

Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, “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.

“Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it? For if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule you, saying, ‘This person began to build and wasn’t able to finish.’


Jesus keeps trying to talk the crowds out of following him! Hate your family? Hate your life? What kind of seeker friendly operation is he running here? Doesn't he know you have to draw people in and then sort out the rest later? It's about reaching the masses, Jesus! Or... maybe we have it wrong in modern Christianity...

Massive crowds follow Jesus because of his healing, his teaching, and because it's the best show around at the time. Some are true followers, some are considering it, some are completely against it, and some are just there to see what happens.

Is Jesus contradicting verses such as Exodus 20:12 and Ephesians 5:21-6:4 where we are instructed to honor our parents, love our families, and consider our family member's needs above our own? Hate seems like a very unchristian thing to do when Jesus says in John 13:35 that onlookers will know we are his disciples by our love.

"Hate" here expresses preference. In Malachi 1:2-3 (quoted in Romans 9:13) God says "Jacob have I loved, but Esau I have hated." This doesn't mean God had Esau's face on some heavenly dartboard. It means God gave his promise through Jacob, not Esau, showing his preference for the younger brother. It was also a Semitic expression used as a way to refer to loving someone less, as in Jacob loving Rachel more than Leah. His feelings are described as hating Leah, but clearly he had some feelings for her.

If we are to be true disciples, we are to love the Lord with all our hearts, all our minds, and all our strength. If family relationships conflict with what the Holy Spirit wants us to do, the Holy Spirit wins out. We must be willing to give up everything - all our possessions, our relationships, even our own lives. When Jesus gives similar instructions in Mark 10 he mentions that anyone who gives up family will receive a hundred times more in the present age, not to mention eternal life. This refers to the family we receive in the body of Christ.

Christians rarely experience true persecution in America. In other countries and religions, turning to Christianity can result in shunning, torture, or execution. Some in America are excluded by families when they convert. Some Americans might experience tension and misunderstandings with family members when they choose to follow Christ, and this should not be trivialized.

The Greek word translated carry, bastazo, means to take up in order to carry or bear, to put upon one's self or to bear what is burdensome. Bearing a cross indicates a willingness to suffer ridicule, pain, and suffering. It is a willingness to put one's life on the line if necessary. Carrying your cross to crucifixion was a mark of an outcast, an extreme criminal. To cling to Christ, you can hold on to nothing else.

In the days before bank loans and mortgages, it would be extremely foolish to begin a building project without securing the means to complete the project. Even today it is unwise to build a building without a plan to finish the building and repay any debts. Anyone seeing the incomplete project will shake their head at best and ridicule you at worst. Likewise, one who will be a true disciple of Christ you must be willing to complete the mission given to him. Many will begin the journey only to find they were the seed sown in shallow ground. Even if we never experience persecution of any kind, we must be willing in advance to suffer anything and give up everything if necessary.

Then he said to the crowd, "If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross daily, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it."  - Luke 9:23-24

Luke 6:12-26

In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God. And when day came, he called his disciples and chose from them twelve, whom he named apostles: Simon, whom he named Peter, and Andrew his brother, and James and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon who was called the Zealot, and Judas the son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.

And he came down with them and stood on a level place, with a great crowd of his disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases. And those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. And all the crowd sought to touch him, for power came out from him and healed them all.

And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said:

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
“Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.
“Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.
“Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.

“But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.
“Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry.
“Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.
“Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets.

 If I were choosing disciples in Jesus' day, perhaps I would have visited Gamaliel's rabbinic school to seek his top students. Perhaps I would have tried to steal some disciples from the Pharisees and Sadducees.  I doubt I would have chosen some fisherman, a tax collector, a religious zealot, an accountant, and some various others. I would not have been so in tune with the will of God. But Jesus' practice was to spend long periods of time in communication with God before times or trial or decision. Putting aside his divinity, he lived as a man and needed time in prayer to seek the Father's will. It is interesting that one who would eventually betray him was selected as one of his closest followers. Jesus knows what it is to be betrayed by a supposed friend! Although many would follow Jesus from place to place, these 12 would be his closest disciples. They would receive special teaching and instruction, and 11 of them would eventually found the church and spread the gospel at the cost of their own lives.

People continue to pursue Jesus to hear his teaching and receive healing. Many were cured by simply being in his presence or managing to get close enough to touch him. Luke's "Sermon on the Plain" closely mirrors Matthew's "Sermon on the Mount". Clearly these are principles taught by Jesus to the multitudes on more than one occasion.

The gospel is not one of "health and wealth". Those that inherit the kingdom of God experience hunger, poverty, and persecution on the earth. Their true reward is in the life to come. Many who are rich and respected in this life have already received their reward and have only eternal punishment in their future. Favor on earth is not necessarily a sign of God's favor on our lives. Do we trust Jesus enough to wait on his blessing rather than chasing the fleeting riches and rewards of this world? Do we seek the favor of God or the acclaim of man?