In this introductory sermon segment, Dr. John A. King reflects on the profound difficulty of truly following Jesus, emphasizing that absolute surrender is not merely an initial commitment but a continuous state throughout the Christian journey. He shares personal struggles with surrender, critiques superficial, lip‑service surrender, and uses the raft‑versus‑speedboat analogy to illustrate active, ongoing participation with Christ. King acknowledges his own lack of all answers, pledging to rely on Scripture and the Holy Spirit, and invites listeners to a 5 p.m. service titled “The Adventure” where he will explore the next stage of following Jesus.
Chapters
Hey, how you doing, church? It is far too early on a Saturday morning for any reasonable human being to be up preparing for tonight's sermon. I'm looking— continuing the series Following Christ, but I'm just struck with how impossible it is. You know, these last 3 weeks I've been preaching on this, following Jesus, and And, you know, giving yourself and dedicating yourself to the process. And I think personally I've never found it more difficult, you know, in my personal life. You know, external, we've always got that facade we put on, but in my personal life is following him and getting after him and, you know, just all that sort of stuff. And, you know, as I woke this morning, I was just struck with the thought that, you know, supernaturally we're drawn to him. And supernaturally, we stay with Him. And supernaturally, we're transformed to be like Him. And the conclusion I'm coming to is that when we talk about absolute surrender at the front end of our Christian walk, we acquiesce to that. We say, yes, I can get that. I get my mind around that. But I think absolute surrender is a state for our entire Christian walk. And when we talked about the raft and the lifeboat— sorry, the raft and the speedboat— that thought or that analogy about to get on there and flow with him, you know, we're still active participants with him. We're still rowing, we're still guiding, we're doing, you know, what he tells us to do. I suppose that's the thought with Jesus. Our Lord said, you know, I only go, only do, only say what I see the Father do. It's that active Absolute surrender, and it's totally foreign, totally foreign to our human nature. And it's given such lip service, such light lip service. You know, oh, I only do what the Father tells me to do. And you meet those people, and then you know that that's just not the truth. They only follow and do what serves their own particular agenda on a thing. Anyway, look, I don't, I don't. I've probably got 8 or 9 hours of study yet to do around the topic, and we'll see how we unpack it tonight. Now, I can't promise you any answers. I know in Texas that's not how you're supposed to do it. You're supposed to have all the answers as a preacher, but, you know, as a man, I don't. And I'm going to just lean heavily on the Word and the Holy Ghost and just see what we come up with. So come along. I'll see you tonight at 5 o'clock on The Adventure and see what the next stage of following Jesus is. Thank you.
