Christ chose you and never looked back! DID YOU DO THE SAME?

As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. Welcome back to the Iron Saints Podcast with your host, Dan Willis.

Good morning, Saints. We are back at it Friday here at last. We're going to keep going through Luke today. For those of you that are new to the program, welcome. Uh, we are working our way through the Book of Luke day by day here. Uh, we've made it all the way to Luke 9. We're almost into Luke 10. Uh, if you guys do like to start things from the beginning though, you want to feel like you're a part of the whole process or journey, feel free to go back. To all of you who have been listening, a huge shout out. Thank you. Absolutely blown away with what you guys have been doing as far as listening and contributing and just the community that's growing is unbelievable. Thank you so much to all of you guys who have decided in recent weeks to leave reviews on the podcast. It's great to get that feedback most of all because that helps me to understand what I might be doing right or wrong. So thank you to all of you who have taken that time to provide a review somewhere online, wherever you may listen to this. It's Greatly appreciated. But today we're going to get down to it, finish off Luke 9, and see how we can move forward here. So let's get down to it. So it seems a fitting end to the week. We get to the end of chapter 9 on Friday. As always, guys, my hope with this podcast was that men would be able to take that 15 minutes a day that maybe they otherwise wouldn't take to just spend on the word, to spend in prayer. So I understand if you guys are listening to this while you're commuting or Or you're at work and you, you can't readily pick up a Bible. But whenever possible, guys, I do encourage that you, you know, grab a Bible, grab your Bible and crack it open. Make sure that you're, you're taking your own notes, putting your own thoughts down. And, and sometimes it's, it's just a different experience to have a Bible in hand. But as always, I will read from the ESV for those that can't get their hands on a Bible at this moment. If you guys have a preference, I'm sure everyone's got their own favorite version, translation, paraphrase, whatever it may be. But for me, I like to read from the ESV. So here we go. Luke 9, verse 57. As they were going along the road, someone said to him, I will follow you wherever you go. And Jesus said to him, foxes have holes and birds have— birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head. To another he said, follow me. But he said, Lord, let me first go and bury my father. Jesus said to him, leave the dead to bury their own dead, but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God. Another said, I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home. And Jesus said to him, no one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God. So this is one of those doozies that's thrown at the end of this chapter, and There's a couple of things here. This is a great passage, I think, for showing Christ as fully man and fully God. So Christ having— we've journeyed with him now where he sends out the apostles after showing them his authority and saying, go and baptize, cast out demons, and heal in my name. And he sends them out and they do that work and they come back. But then little by little, they start to slip. They start to fade back. They have arguments about who's the best. They have arguments about what they're going to destroy. Who should be destroyed for not doing what Jesus wants. They have arguments about rejecting people because they're different. All of these arguments start to come, and Christ, you can see, is mountingly getting more and more irritated as we go here, because what he thought was a simple thing of have faith, believe, walk with me, is instead proving to be increasingly more and more difficult. And some of his frustration, I think, is showing here. Now, Paul is very quick to teach us in his epistles that, you know, be angry, but do not sin, right? And here you can almost feel his frustration where somebody will yell out, I'll go wherever you'll go. And Jesus is like, you can't go where I'm going. Maybe that person didn't know, but Over the past chapter, we've seen twice now Christ alluding to the fact that he knows what's coming. He is actually getting ready to take up his cross. And so when somebody says, I'll follow you wherever you'll go, he's like, no, you have your place. Foxes have holes, birds have nests. You have your place, but I have nowhere to rest. I am going a place you cannot go. To another, Jesus says, "Follow me," right? Okay, just follow me. Like this has always been it. Have faith, believe, and follow me. Follow me. Well, I can't do that. I got to go bury my dad. Okay, is it that Jesus doesn't recognize that there is a time to mourn? No, it's not. It's that he's he's just at this point exasperated, saying, "Just focus on the thing that is most important here." Focus on it. Jesus said to him, leave the dead to bury their own dead, but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God. Another said, I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home. So I just need to say goodbye to everybody first. You know, I'm okay to follow you, but I just need to say goodbye to everybody. And he finishes with something that's really interesting. And this is probably the part of the passage that stuck out the most for me. No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God. That one is pretty telling and powerful and fear-inducing for me, at least. This idea that if you choose Christ, if you choose Christ, or I should say, if Christ chose you and has said, follow me, And you walk with him a while and decide that you need to just take a moment and kind of pull back from the plow. There's ramifications to that decision. That's a big thing. This is not an easy passage to read. It's not an easy passage to pull apart because the conclusion here is if you're in, you need to be in. The best that I can equate this to, guys, is— and it really does falter and fail, but, um, in many ways in, in the worldly sense— but it reminds me a lot of a marriage.

Yeah.

If you decide that you're gonna be married to someone and then you opt to take your hand off the plow— and, and you guys can figure out what that means in, in whatever way you want— but there's a lot of different ways that a marriage can fall apart emotionally, physically, spiritually. There's lot of ways that it can pull together or pull apart. People get tired, people get frustrated, and they just turn from it. But when you turn from that, if you turn from your marriage, it's going to fall apart. And that's often a metaphor that Christ used to define the church and God's relationship. But if you turn from your marriage, To place other things for a time in priority over it, you're showing what the priority is. And Christ, I think here, is at a moment where he is tired, he is frustrated. He knows that something's coming that is massive. He understands the implications of it, so he's probably got some anxiety. And people would like to think of him as, no, he's wholly perfect all the time. No, we see Christ feel emotion. We see him feel anger. We see him feel exhaustion. We see him feel these things. That's what makes it so beautiful that he's both fully God and fully man. But in this, he's saying, if you enter into this relationship with God and make the decision to take your hand off that relationship for whatever reason— it's too hard, you lose interest, there's no more passion, the church itself causes some division— People in the church cause some division. Whatever it may be that drives you from God, that— it just can't be. This is Christ telling those that are around him, especially I think his apostles at this point, keep your hand on the plow. Keep focused. Do what you're supposed to be doing. Christ's teachings are not that massive. I know people make it out to be like there's a ton of rules, but he also takes the time to boil it down to some pretty simple things. Go then, baptizing all the nations in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And I will be with you always until the end of the day. He's never going to leave us, and he will always be with us as we do that work. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, and your mind. Love your neighbor as yourself. Against these things there is no law, and in them is the entirety of the law. That's not that hard. That's not that much to do. It just isn't. So I challenge you guys today. First, get simple. Get simple in your relationship with God, because when you make it complicated, it's going to be complicated. Make it simple. Have you chosen to follow? Great. Then when you go out in the world, make sure that you're sharing his gospel. Use words. Use deeds. But do it. If the opportunity to baptize comes, baptize. If the opportunity to share the word of the Lord comes, share. And act in love. Love those close to you. Love those far from you. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. It's not an easy challenge. I know it sounds easy today, but that's Not easy. It's a lot of work, just like any good relationship is. All right guys, I'm gonna pray for you. For those of you that have prayer requests that would like to have them prayed for, I'm happy to do so anywhere on social media. All the description, all of the links are in the description below. Feel free to reach out to me. There's lots of different ways to get ahold of me. If you have a prayer request, please, please, please don't hesitate to put it forward. There's lots of men that have been doing this and it's been a blessing to be able to lift them up. Lord, thank you so much for the men of this community. I pray for all of those that are seeking you, Lord, that they would put their hand to the plow and not turn back. I pray for all of those that are hurting, Lord, those that need healing. There are so many out there that have asked for prayer requests for their daughter who is sick and needs surgery, their wife, wife that needs surgery, themselves that need surgery. There's pain, there's death, there's cancer, there's illness. There's, there's so, so many out there, Lord, and you see them all. And for us, it seems so overwhelming and so impossible. And yet at the same time, there is healing that comes in you, Lord. And it may not always be of the flesh, but there is always healing. Pray for those that are struggling for work, Lord. There are many that are perfectly happy not to work, but for us, you have told us as men to go out and work, to toil. To earn by the sweat of our brow, to provide for our homes. So for those men out there that are struggling to find that work, Lord, I lift them up to you. Float a hammer for them. Find them an opportunity to serve. Find them an opportunity to work for their families and provide as their hearts desire. Most of all, Lord, I lift up the men this week as they head into their weekend that they would Come a little closer to you and our relationship. They would love those around them. They would love those difficult relationships that are causing frustration. Most of all, Lord, I would pray that they go out with the gospel. In your name we pray. Have an amazing weekend, guys. I'm still trying to figure out what to do with Saturday morning, so if you have any suggestions, please. Let me know. It just feels like it should be something different than us just continuing forward. And if the majority of the feedback that I get is just keep going with the scripture, then that's what I'll be doing. But there is opportunity for new ideas on Saturdays where it could be a little bit different, the episode on Saturday. So if you guys have any thoughts, again, just shoot them out to me on any of the social media platforms. Lots of different ways to connect with me. The website is up now. So Anywhere where you guys can reach out to me, please do so. And I would love to hear your thoughts on what you would like to hear on Saturday morning. Have a great weekend, guys.

Thank you for listening to the Iron Saints Podcast. If you are looking to share your prayer requests, check the description for social media or email to contact the show. Blessings on you all until next time.