How To Be A Disciple(From Our 11-10-24 Worship)

West Side Church of Christ - Elkton Ky

Watch The Video Version Here: https://youtu.be/JORn1eGY9gc

Transcript:
You know, we, we think about them often just as soulless corporations. Just these big businesses who are organized for just one purpose, to get more and more and more money. And in some cases, that's probably absolutely true. But we often forget that these companies, as large as they may have grown to in our modern day and times, They generally started out with one person.

And that one person did have a soul and they didn't have a personality and they did have a pretty interesting reason for doing what they were doing. Give me an example. If I say to you the name Walmart, what do you think? Oh no. Right. But. Did you know the guy behind it? You probably do. His name is Sam Walton.

You know, the other Wholesale side of the business is what? Sam's Club. Because of Sam Walton. And Sam Walton, you know, changed the way that all of us shop. This idea of a retailer who could carry almost everything and have it in one place. Rather, no telling how much money Sam Walton and his stores have made.

But, but where did he get the idea for all those extra low prices? I mean, how do you, how do you go from little town in Arkansas to worldwide corporation with global brand recognition? How do you get there? Well, in 1940, Mr. Sam. was had had taken a brand new job and he was put into the training phase of this company.

And it also was a department store type setup. He would work for this company for about 18 months until he was drafted into World War Two. But even though his career was cut short there, the time that he spent there affected him for the rest of his life. You see, when he went into this business, he went into the management side of it, and the training school they had there was very in depth.

This retailer, at the time, had over 1, 600 stores all over the continental United States. Remember, this is 1940. This is pre America in World War II. No internet, no social media, nothing. Just a massive retailing giant. But one day, the owner of that company, whose name is James Cash. Now, he's the president over the whole deal.

He, the last thing he has time to be doing is to coming out and to train new management recruits, right? But Mr. Cash is walking through the headquarters there one day and saw this, this group of young trainees. And one of the skills they were learning that day was how to how to tie up a package. Remember some a lot of you in the room may not remember, but used to you go to box, you go store and buy something and they would actually wrap it for you.

I'd wrap it up paper and put a bow on it, you know, and it wasn't just Christmas wrapping. I mean, it was just what you did. Well, Mr Cash stopped his day, stopped what he was doing. Walked up to a young Sam Walton who was trying to figure out how to wrap a package and basically said to the equivalent of, son, come here, let me show you this.

And he showed him how to wrap that package the most efficient way using the least amount of paper and the least amount of ribbon. And it made an impression on Mr. Walton. It was later besaid that he would turn into one of Mr. Cash's disciples, if you will. That's a word that he used. You see, James Cash was actually James Cash Penny.

What a name. You may know his store is JC Penny. And we look at that company today and you know, it's had to shut down a bunch of stores. It's it's still going through a massive reorganization and for all intents and purposes to us, that's a dying company. But you have no idea. that JCPenney helped launch Walmart.

Mr Cash come from a background where the first stores that he actually opened were called the Golden Rule. We got a hardware store named Golden Rule, but he had a massive chain and literally the operating principles of the business were founded on the Golden Rule. A lot of those things affected. Mr.

Walton when he opened his own business. You think about that? That's this is a great example of what it means to be a disciple of someone. It means to be a learner, a follower. Now, does walmart look and operate just exactly like J. C. Penny? No, but he learns him. He observed him and he took those principles and he applied it to his own store.

Of course, today we're not here to talk about how to open your own retailing giant, right? I want to talk to you about being a disciple of someone else. Being a disciple of Jesus. You know, we all learn from other people. Maybe there's someone on your job who has taken you under their wing and trained you and showed you how to do what it is that you do.

But, spiritually speaking, Jesus has done that for all of us. He has given us everything that we need for life. and godliness. We have it here in this word that we can pick up and hope in our hands. And he still calls us today to be learners of him and followers of him. But how do you do that? How do you be a disciple of Jesus?

Well, if you got your bibles going into Luke 14, that's where we're going today. We're gonna go to Luke 14 and we're not really gonna go anywhere else. Jesus here in Luke 14 bowls it down very Very simply for us if you want basically a one two three step program of how to be a disciple Jesus gives it to us and It's very interesting.

I'm going to start it to end because Jesus sums it up in verse 33 and he says this So therefore any one of you who do who does not renounce all that he has? Cannot be my disciple Now you think You think about that word, renounce. That's not a, that's not a word we use every day. But Jesus basically said, you can't be my disciple if you don't renounce.

That word means to give up interest in something else. To give up interest in something else. Jesus, what do I have to renounce to be your disciple? All that he has? Is that material things? Amen. Is that our own life? Yeah, basically. But now, you say, Doug, hang on a minute. That doesn't sound right. I mean, it's almost like you're saying we should shave our heads and sell everything that we have and go up in the mountains and be monks in monasteries.

Like, we should just That's not what he's saying. That's not what he's saying here. How do you renounce all that you have? How do you be a disciple? I don't know. Well, I think that Jesus tells us that in the previous verses And this morning what we want to do. We're gonna we're gonna back up several verses And we're gonna begin to step through these things and talk about how do they apply to us?

What do they look like right? This is a first century principle, but what does it look like? How does it apply in a 21st century world? in twenty twenty four about to be twenty twenty five. Where's twenty twenty four when? I don't even know. I mean, we're already coming on Thanksgiving. I drove by the other day and saw it on the sign.

I thought, is it time for that already? Yeah, it is. How do we be a disciple today? Alright. Got your Bibles back with back up with me to verse twenty five and twenty six. You see, there's several, there's several things here and really what I'm gonna key in on this morning is three different verbs. Three different verbs that I believe that, that shows us how do we renounce all t...