Doesn't it always sound like he's going to say something else? I was waiting after he ceded, and I didn't get nothing. I was disappointed. Mark 1, if you would. Mark 1. I'm going to preach to you for the first time tonight on my Ruckman Reference Bible, so this will be truly inspired. Amen. You know, someone bought this for me. And there's just some comfort to an old Bible. You know what I mean? You know where everything's at. Turns well. Just in a moment, if you had the spontaneous Bible drill, you're ready. Because you got your Bible broken, you know. I get those all the time, those spontaneous Bible drills. Those all the time, they just pop up. So it's hard to, I've been reading out of it for the past year, trying to break it in, just reading out of it, and so I'm just stepping out. So if it takes me a while to find the verse, just bear with me, because it's not there where it's normally supposed to be. That's where I'm having issues. It's like, that verse is right, I know it's there. Lord, you took it out. I have to call Dr. Ruckman and talk to him about that. Mark chapter 1, and let's go to verse number 16. Now as he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishers. Jesus said unto them, Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men. And straightway they forsook their nets and followed him. And when he had gone a little further a fence, he saw James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, who also were in the ship, mending their nets. And straightway he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the ship with the hired servants and went after him." Go over to Matthew 4. And verse 18 is the companion passage to this. That was Mark's account. Now here is Matthew's account of that. Jesus in verse 18 of Matthew 4 walking by the Sea of Galilee saw two brethren Simon called Peter and Andrew his brother casting a net into the sea for they were fishers and he saith unto them follow me and I will make you fishers of men and straightway and they straightway left their nets and followed him and going on from offense he saw other two brethren James the son of Zebedee and John his brother in the ship with the Zebedee, their father, mending their nets, and he called them, and they immediately left the ship and their father and followed him. I'd like to speak to you tonight about follow me, follow me. It's kind of one of those things where you read through Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and if you've been saved any length of time, you read that stuff in its old hat to you. But if you stop and consider, here are four men, not teenagers, but well into years, and probably going to take over the business that dad had, and moving on with their lives. And here comes Jesus Christ along, and all he says to them is, follow me. And they absolutely drop everything that they're doing, their livelihood and everything, and they leave and follow. Now, I don't know what Mr. Zebedee had to say, but I know what my dad would have said in such a case as that. If I'd have been out rototilling the garden and he'd have come looking for me later, if I'd have told him, well, this man Jesus walked by and asked me to come with him, so I left, that wouldn't have flew at all. That wouldn't have gone. But here comes Jesus Christ by, and all he says to them is, follow me. And it's very, there are two very, very simple words, follow me, but yet there's so much to them. Everyone wants to be, and everyone desires to be, I believe, a disciple of Jesus Christ. Everyone would probably say that you do follow him, but the question is, do you? Because in following him automatically puts you into several different categories of things that you're already doing. We believe that follow me is the basic fundamental and primary command for anyone when called by God to do his service. Follow me is so essential in one's calling. For if Peter or any of us ceases to follow Christ, we will no longer be serving him. On the other hand, if we faithfully follow him, we will indeed be in the place where we can fulfill our calling. So follow me is where service begins. It is where a call begins. but it is all prefaced, that is the service and answering the call is all prefaced with follow me. Follow me shows the importance of devotion to Jesus Christ if we are going to fulfill any kind of calling in his service. So before any kind or type of service, we must realize what is meant by follow me. Most of us tonight would probably say in some way, shape or form, we are serving God. But are you following him? Are you walking the path that he's walking? In order to follow someone, I must be walking with them, behind them, in some way, shape, or form. My kids are still confused by the fact that if they're in front of the shopping cart, why it is that they get run over. You know, they're over there to the right, and we're going along right, and I'm going to turn, and we run into them, and they get upset. And I said, well, listen, you don't know what way we're going. So in order to follow along, you have to be either beside me or you have to be behind me. Otherwise, you're out front doing whatever it is that you feel like you want to do. So in order to follow him, I have to be following him. Such a hard concept, yet such an easy thing, really, to do. Most of us would say, well, I'm serving the Lord here, and I'm serving the Lord here, and I'm serving the Lord, yeah, but you have to be following that path that He's walking. We talked about obedience in men's prayer over the past couple of months, and we talked about that complete and that full obedience. That complete and full obedience walks this path right here. The path that Jesus Christ laid out for me, that full obedience follows that path, and it doesn't deter anywhere else. For in the moment that I turn left or turn right, I am no longer in full obedience to the direction that He wants me to go. So if I am serving Him, that's great, and we put so many things under that service category. Sure, there's a lot of things that God never intended to be putting under the serving God category, yet we're easy to throw many things under there just to make us feel better about the things that we do. He says to His disciples, He says, follow Me. It's very, very simple. Very easy thing to do really. And it does require, we're going to look at three things that it does require. Go to John 10. If I am going to follow Jesus Christ, if I am going to consider myself a disciple, if I'm going to consider myself someone who is serving Him, I must first do what these men did in such a simple thing. When he comes by and says, let's go, we must get up and go. I cannot consider myself in full surrender and in full service to him if at some point earlier in my life he asked me to do something and I said no. and went my own way. And a lot of times, we'll say no, and what we do is we still find ourselves 10 years down the road still in church. So therefore, we consider ourselves still in obedience to Jesus Christ. When in fact, if you would rewind 10 years ago at a Bible conference and he asked you to do, and you said no, You at that moment stopped following him. Here's what you did. If Jesus Christ came to you, I like illustrations, it makes people think, and it's Wednesday and you need to think. If Jesus Christ said, I want you to go down this road, so you go down this road, and we're walking down this road, and this is a great road. It really is, it's a great road. But if somewhere in that road, I come over here, and I sit down here behind Brother Kevin, I am no longer, even though I am in church, I am no longer following. I am no longer in obedience to the direction that He wanted me to go. I have then chosen my own way. And a lot of times we choose a way that is some sense of spiritual, and so then it makes us feel and it makes us think that I'm still obeying, and I'm still fully surrendered to Him, when in fact, I directly disobeyed the one command that He gave me to do. And so to say, okay, follow me, okay, that's easy, but man, it's so hard because what it does is it causes me to do several things. The first thing it does is it causes me to listen. If I'm going to follow, I have to listen. John chapter 10, verse 27. I'm in chapter 9, that's why verse 27 doesn't make any sense. See, there's that verse, not there. John 10 verse 27 says, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they what? They follow me. Whenever, wherever we were when I was growing up, when my dad said my name, there was no guessing of how he said my name. My mother was the same way. I will not tell you what she called me because you're not allowed to do so. And if I say it, you'll do it. See, Mark's laughing. He knows he'd do it. There are certain things. McKenna, I'm still baffled at myself to this day of why we called her McKenna. Rarely do I call her by that name. I rarely use that name when I call her. I call her Brooke. That is her middle name. Called her probably 10 times a day, called her Brooke. And she responds to it. I don't know why I do that, but I do. There was a certain way my dad said my name. There's a certain name my mom used for me. And when they spoke, I listened because I was their child. Jesus Christ says, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. If I'm going to consider myself a follower first of Jesus Christ, I have to listen. Because if I don't, first of all, listen, how do I know where to go? Point in case you ever begin to tell your kids to do something, and on sentence number two they leave and go, and you're standing there baffled going, you didn't get the full thing, so you don't even know what I intended you to complete. A lot of times we hear the first thing that Jesus Christ says, but we don't let him finish. Because a lot of times, we don't want him to finish because we know where he's going to finish at. And we shut him off. We need to listen. How do we need to listen? Listening is a hard thing to do. I would say at this point in our day and age, listening is an art. Listening is something that you make yourself do. We are programmed for 10-minute segments, and then we need a commercial. That's what we are programmed for. To sit and listen to someone is an absolute art. Luke chapter 18, let's go there. How do we need to listen? How do we need to listen? Luke 18, verse 35. So then it came to pass that as he was come nigh unto Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the wayside begging. And he heard the multitude pass by, and he asked what it meant. And they told him that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by. And he cried, saying, Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me. And they that went before rebuked him, that he should hold his peace. And he cried so much the more, thou Son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus stood and commanded him to be brought unto him. And when he was come near, he asked, saying, What wilt that I should do unto thee? And he said, Lord, that I may receive my sight. Jesus said unto him, Receive thy sight, thy faith hath saved thee. And immediately he received his sight and what? Followed him. Notice this he listened immediately he listened immediately verse 40 Jesus stood and Commanded him to be brought and when he was come near he asked him. It wasn't a thing of him sitting there crying Listen, he was blind. He didn't have any idea. He couldn't see anything that was going on. All he could do was hear He was just hearing it's probably why he heard so well. It's because he couldn't see and His hearing was how he got around. His hearing was how he knew what was happening around him. And here Bartimaeus sits just listening. And he asked, what's going on? And they said, Jesus Christ is coming by. And he said, hey, that guy can help me. I'm going to start crying for help. And obviously, there were some Baptists in the crowd because some people started rebuking him. They said, listen, we don't do it that way around here. This church has been here 30 plus years. We've never done it that way. You just sit there and be quiet, sir. And he did another Baptist thing. He just ignored them and cried louder. Two great Baptist attributes right there. Jesus didn't go to him, and that is key. A lot of times God isn't going to come to you in your circumstance. He's going to stand where he is, and he's going to call out to you, and you need to listen. because him coming to me makes it really easy. You ever do that with your kids? You wait for them to come to you? Why? Because they need to learn that it's some on your part too, pal. I'm not going to do everything for you. Jesus Christ stands and commanded him to be brought near and he came and listened immediately. Notice he listened intently. He didn't have to say, could you repeat that again, please, sir? I wasn't not really quite sure what it was that you said. He didn't say to him, well, I drifted off mid-sentence, Lord. I didn't catch the end of that. Ever do that to your wife? Drift off mid-sentence? Drift off word number two? And then you come back around and she's just smiling at you, and you're thinking, oh, man. That was a great dinner you cooked tonight, sweetie. It was wonderful. It was wonderful. He didn't drift. He listened intently. Why? Because this was extremely important to him. You'll follow Jesus Christ if it's important to you. If it's not important to you, you won't follow. I know this already at this point in my many years of ministry. I know this. I will never make anyone serve God. Parents will, from now until the day I have a cane and I'm still trying to be a youth pastor with my walker, whatever day it is that we check out, parents will get upset with me because, well, my kid didn't get this and my kid didn't get this. I cannot make your kid do anything. The good kids at Hope Baptist Church are not a product of an awesome youth pastor. It's shocking, I know, okay? So hold back. Good kids are a product of good homes. Mom and dad do the work. If you want to serve God, if you want to follow Him, you've got to listen. But we don't listen anymore. We like to talk. We like to talk so much that when someone else is talking to us, we're not listening to them, we're sitting there waiting to talk. I have one person in my mind right now, bless their heart, that, and they don't come to church here, okay? It's not Brother John, don't worry about that. that I know that when I begin to talk to her, and my wife won't know who it is right away, and that we see her over the fence, and we wave at her, and we try not to get too close. Because I know what two subjects we're gonna talk about. And it's not gonna matter what I say. It's not gonna matter how dejected or how happy I am about what I'm talking about. We're gonna talk about two subjects. And I can interject different things at different times if I choose to. Or I could just stand there the entire hour and let her talk about the two subjects. Bless her heart. Why? Because we are not conversational people. Well, we are conversational people. We're one-way conversational people. We don't listen. And the reason we don't have a relationship with God as the disciples did, the disciples did a lot of listening. Jesus did the majority of the talking. And the disciples listened. We have two ears and only one tongue in order that we may hear more and speak less. It is better to listen in order to understand than to listen in order to reply. I don't know what to say to you if I don't listen. If I'm not sitting here gathering information while you're talking, I don't know what to say to you. which is a lot of times why we don't really have good conversations because nobody's really listening. Here's eight listening practices if you want some eight practical things. Number one, this is the groundbreaking stuff. Stop talking. Put yourself this week in a conversation where you don't talk. And what I mean by this is you don't add. If they come to you to talk about something, let them talk about it. Add a comment, but stop talking. Because the reason why we lose track of what we're saying, because we're jumping subjects all over the place. We're like jackrabbits in a field. We're just all over the place. We're over here, and oh, that flower's pretty over there, and this is great over here. Number two, listen for understanding. When your God speaks to you, listen for understanding. Get what he's saying to you. Number three, ask for clarification. You ever have to ask God for clarification on something? Oh, I think I heard you on that, Lord. Pretty loud and clear, but I sure would like you to say it again if you could. I've had several instances like that myself, because I didn't like what he said. So I figured if we ask again, maybe I just heard him wrong, and he'd change it. Let the speaker know that you have heard. Let God know that you heard what he said. That's why responding to preaching is a great thing, because it doesn't let me know that you heard anything, but it lets God know that you heard. Amen. That was well received. Number five, be patient and present. In other words, don't drift. Word number two. be here. Because here's what I think we're going to find. We've got all these issues and troubles in our life, and we're going to stand before God someday, and God's going to go, how come you never got that fixed? Oh, the preacher never preached nothing about it. I went down to church for 30 years. 30 years I went there, and they never said nothing about it. And down the big screen comes. There's 800 clips up there, and the Lord's like, which one would you like me to choose? Which one? Would you like when you drifted on word two? Would you like when you drifted on minute number eight? Number six, listen with an open mind. For this generation, don't put your own spin on it. When God says something to you, don't rephrase it for him. Well, what he truly really meant was, no, no. What he meant was that right there. That's what he meant. He didn't mean anything different by it. Number seven, pay attention to the environment. Shut out the background noise. We don't hear from God and we don't have God in our lives as they used to back in the old days is because we have too much background noise. Shut your TV off. You wanna help your marriage? Shut your TV off. Well received again. Number eight, listen with purpose. In other words, put your agenda aside. Instead of coming to church looking for one specific thing, come to church with whatever God you want to give me, that's what I'll take. When you open your Bible to read it and to study it, come in there not with your agenda, not with you looking for something, not with your spitefulness towards everybody else that God's going to give you a verse on. Come with an open mind. Come with some purpose. You need to listen. If I'm going to follow, I'm going to have to listen. Go to Luke chapter 9. Luke chapter 9. Not only am I going to have to listen. Luke chapter 9 verse 57. It says, And it came to pass that as they went in the way, a certain man said unto him, Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. And Jesus said unto him, Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head. And he said unto another, Follow me. But he said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God. And another also said, Lord, I will follow thee. But let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home at my house. And Jesus said unto him, No man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God. Second thing you're going to have to do, you're going to have to do some leaving. You're going to have to do some leaving. You're going to have to listen. But there are going to be some things that you are going to have to leave. They can't be with you anymore. You have to part with them. The first thing you have to part with is luxuries. Luxuries. The first man offers it to Jesus Christ and says, Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest. And Jesus, who knew his thoughts of his heart, said to him, Foxes have holds and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head. And I find it interesting that in all of three of these instances, there is no response from any of them. which is often the case with us. I'm ready to follow, Lord, whatever you say we're gonna do. God, that's where I'm headed. Well, I want you to go here, and they don't have any of the stuff that you like. Oh. No response. If I'm going to follow, I'm gonna have to leave. There are gonna be some things that I don't get to be a part of. There's going to be some things that are not a part of my life. I was very much damaged as a young man. As you can tell, I'm just a shell of a man. I was never involved heavily into any sporting events at all. Neither were any of my siblings. Why? Because if we were going to serve God the way that my dad thought we should serve God, all of that had to be left. It had to be pushed to the side. Now, I didn't like it. I thought it was unfair. And to make it worse, on Thursday nights for church, when we were going into church, I could see all of my friends playing baseball. But I'm sure glad that he taught me what things to leave and what things aren't important. Because as you can see, my major league career has taken me many places. I had a friend growing up, and we did have basketball in the very large school that I went to. I was in a class of three. I was a salutatorian. You believe that? Unbelievable. Just a whiz. Absolute whiz. I had a kid I played basketball with. And you know, when you're a teenager, you're a small fish. Big pond. Big pond, small fish mentality. You thought you were good. Well, I had a friend of mine, and his dad, we were sitting watching the Bulls play, because the Bulls were the team to watch when I was in high school. And he would sit there, yeah, yep, Jim can do that. Look at how slow they're going. Look at that. They're just barely getting up and down the court. And I looked at him, with as much respect as I could muster for him, and I said, no, no. They're all going that fast. They're all that fast. They're all that big. It just looks slow because everybody's going the same speed. I'd be like looking at a NASCAR race when they're going 180 miles an hour. Just look how slow. Look at that. They're all together in a bunch. Nobody's going fast at all. No, no, no. They're all that fast. They're all that good. I was taught that there are some things that if I was going to serve God the way that God desires me to do it, I can't be a part of them. The only reason I play any... I'm pretty good at softball, I think, most days. Amen. The only reason I do that is because we have a church softball team. Without that, I wouldn't do it. Why? Because it would interfere too much with serving God. Going over like a lead balloon. Oh, yeah. Whatever you teach your mom and dad is how far they're going to take it. There are some luxuries that I'm not gonna be able to have. Paul puts it perfectly to Timothy in 1 Timothy 6, 8. He says, in having food and raiment, let us therewith be content. God didn't even promise you a roof over your head. He promised you food and clothes. And we whine and complain and moan. And God never promised you that. To borrow a phrase, He never promised you a rose garden for sure. you ain't getting that. Too many luxuries make it into our lives and interfere with my following God. And too many times we're fooled into thinking, because I come to church, I'm following God. No, you're just coming to church. It doesn't mean you're following God and it doesn't mean you're serving Him. Those are three separate categories all together. Listen, I come here for me. Do you think God needs me to come to church so he can make it through another week? He's like, whew, man, I'm glad Heaton went to church today. I was getting ready to hang up the towel there and just throw it in. No, that's for me. I don't trip over myself tomorrow. Probably still will anyways. I'm going to have to give up luxuries. The second thing he says here is you're going to have to give up loved ones, and we don't like that. But if you've been saved any period of time, I guarantee you say this, you probably have people in this church that mean more to you than even your own family. If you have lost family members, I know that's true. There's gonna be some things in your loved ones and in your family that you're not going to be able to be a part of. And Jesus said here to this man, he said, listen, at a very difficult time in this man's life, he said, listen, pal, let the dead guy bury the dead guy. Don't mess around with him. So that's his harsh and mean. No, he's trying to make a point. The most important thing in your life is obedience to Jesus Christ. Missionaries today, and I say this, they have it easier because we have airplanes and we can fly back and forth. And if some bad tragedy happens, the churches on this side generally get together and pay for a plane ticket. But listen, years ago, when you got on a boat and you're on there for three months to get wherever you were going, you left everything behind. And whatever happened with your family and your friends and your church happened because you followed God down the path that he wanted to take you. But so many luxuries have come in that we're not willing to leave loved ones or any of those things behind anymore. If I'm going to follow God, listen, I'm going to make my family mad. There's going to be some point in time that I'm going to take them off. I'll say this, even if they're saved, you're going to take them off. Because there's gonna come a time and point in your life if you're trying to serve God the way that He wants you to and have the standards and convictions that He wants you to, you're gonna have to say no to your saved family. Which seems odd. It happens so much. Because just because someone is saved and in church doesn't mean that they're following God. Jesus Christ comes to these men and says, follow me. but so much more was there. They're listening, they're leaving. The third thing is leaving long-term, verses 61 and 62. Jesus Christ says to him, no man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God. God is not asking you to follow Him for five minutes. God wants you for a lifetime. When He asks you to follow Him, He wants your undivided attention. He doesn't want you to be pulled off to the left or the right. If God says, we're gonna go out of this auditorium out of the back door, if I go to the left or the right, I've disobeyed. If I look back, I've disobeyed. Lot's wife, boy, I don't think she could think anything after she was salt, but if she could, I bet she thought, man, I wish I hadn't looked back. He said, He's not even fit for the kingdom of God if I look back. That is a long-term thing that Jesus Christ desires of me. Paul says to Timothy in 2 Timothy 3.14, But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned, and hast been assured of knowing of whom thou hast learned them. He says to the young man, you need more than anything else to continue. You need to continue. 2 Timothy 4.7 says, I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have kept the faith. Paul could say to the young man, you need to continue because that's exactly what I've done. Everything God has asked me to do, I've done it long term. I wonder what our testimony will be someday when we get to the end of the road. When we put your body in a casket, are we going to be able to say they followed Jesus Christ? Not they were a good church member, not they were a good person, not they came faithfully to church, but they followed Jesus Christ. It was evident in their life that every day they were trying to the best of their ability to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ. I forgot to bring it with me, but I was going to bring up Buttprints in the Sand again and read it to you. It's one of my favorite poems. It's an absolute great poem. Because it describes, generally, our life. And it describes Jesus Christ for us, and it describes us walking along with Jesus Christ, and then noticing that there's only one set of footprints anymore. And the man asked Jesus Christ, he said, what is this odd-looking shape here on the ground? And Jesus Christ lets him know, when I got tired of carrying you, I dropped you on your butt. It is a great poem, and I thank Randy Gazarek for it. He found it, and he gave it to me. long-term, not just for the next couple minutes, not while it's just convenient for me. If I'm going to follow Him, I'm going to have to leave things behind. I'm going to have to leave the luxuries of loved ones, and I'm going to have to go at long-term, not just for right now, not just for today. If I want my kids to turn out, listen, I can't just serve God, I can't just follow God short-term. It's got to be the long haul. It has to be every day. The third thing, if I'm going to follow Him, go to Luke 9, verse 23. Luke 9, 23, He said unto them all, If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. There's going to have to be some letting go. Some letting go. Not only some leaving, but some letting go. Not only some listening, but some letting go. And the first thing is some personal things. He said that you are going to have to deny yourself. I'm not going to have to deny you, because that would be very easy for me to do. Oh, you're not allowed to do that, which we're very good at as Baptists. Oh, look at that. And that's on my list. And you just did it. That's horrible. That's not living for God. That's not serving God. Me living for God, me following Jesus Christ is me having my own list. And me keeping track of my own stuff. And me saying, you know what, this is kind of okay, but I know for myself that really bothers my walk with Jesus Christ. And I've got a friend who they can do that, but you know for me, I just can't do it. And we're not talking about, you know, Sunday night drinking after church. That's where we all like to go. Oh, you had to give up smoking, huh? No, I'm not talking about any of that kind of stuff, smoking, drinking, none of that. I'm talking about the stuff in your life that nobody knows about and that hinders your walk with God. You have to deny yourself daily if you're going to follow Him. It's personal. That's why it's called a personal walk with God. If I'm going to follow him, I'm not going to ask for the medicine to keep track of it for me. Although, he would love to do that. He loves sarcasm and cynicism as much as I do, and he would love that job. And I would love if he would let me keep track of his, too. But I don't work that way. And I'm thankful for that, because, boy, what a mess we'd be in, huh? Wouldn't be pretty. Matthew 19, 21, Jesus said unto him, if thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast and give to the poor and thou shall have treasure in heaven and come and follow me. The invitation was there to the rich young ruler. Jesus Christ gave him the instructions of what he was supposed to do. And he said, when you get all that done, come back and follow me. Verse 22 says, he went away sorrowful. Why? Well, it was too much personally. for him to give up. Too much personally for him to let go. Money was the thing, possessions was the thing that held him down. A good young man, yeah, I mean, I don't see anything wrong with him. Keeping that list of stuff, done better than I've ever done. But the personal possessions and the belongings and the things of this world is what he could not let go of. And because those things held on to him, he never followed Jesus Christ. never followed. Go to Philippians chapter 3. The Apostle Paul speaking here gives a couple verses that we know well. But I want you to think about the context of it. And these are a couple verses that preachers like to jump in and, you know, you pull out a thought and you run through the field with it kind of preaching, which is fun preaching. That's good camp meeting preaching. You just dive in, grab a thought, and you run. And whatever is along the way, you just grab it and throw it in. Makes for good doctrine along the way. You know, you just have a big pot of you don't know what at the end of the message, but it was good. It was exciting. Philippians chapter 3, the Apostle Paul talking about the flesh and the issues with it. Verse 4, he says, though I might also have confidence in the flesh, if any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more. Circumcise the eighth day of the stock of Israel, the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as touching the law of Pharisee. Concerning zeal, persecuting the church, touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. But what things were gained to me? Those I counted lost for Christ. Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but lost for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things. And do count them but dung that I may win Christ." Interesting thought what the Apostle Paul gave up. He didn't give up possessions. He didn't give up great things. He didn't give up anything that we would think is any great value. You know what he gave up? He gave up position. in a religious society that he, as a young man, had worked years to get. He gave up a position where he was looked up to. He gave up a position where when he talked, people moved. He gave up power. As a man, he gave up great power. When he talked, people, when Paul talked, people died. When he said, take him out and kill him, they took him out and killed him. Nobody asked a question. He gave up position and he gave up power. What did he give it up for? He says, but what things were gained to me, those I counted lost for Christ. Whatever your category might be tonight, it might not be possessions, it might not be the thing that would hold me back, but whatever it is, you got to give it up just as much as the Apostle Paul did. God didn't let Paul keep that position. God didn't let Paul keep that power. When Paul came into the church into Acts, listen, Peter and those fellows had to talk the churches into letting them, letting Paul into the church because nobody wanted him in there because they're all afraid of him. Why? Because when they said Saul, there was fear with that name. There was power with that name. And Paul said, those things that I had counted dear to me, that stock that he came from in verse five, that blamelessness that he talked about in verse six. Listen, he's saying even though he was killing people, it was for the cause that he believed was right and true. And nobody could hold it up against him. And Paul said, all of that, I counted loss. But he said, I counted at loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and do count them but done, that I may win Christ. What was he going to win? Go to verse number 10. Here's what Paul would win, that I may know him. and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death. Verse 14, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. That's what Paul won. He gave up all of that. He gave up all that power, that position, all of that rank for one thing, to know and to follow Jesus Christ. That's what he gave it up for. He said, I gave up all of that to win Jesus Christ. Question would be, what are you holding on to to lose the rest of your life over? What are you holding on to that will not allow you as a dad, or as a mom, or as a single, or as a teenager to move in the area, and in the position, and in the place that God would have you to be someday? And you keep saying no, and no, and no, and no. And Paul said, you know what? Verses five and six, all of that, loss, done, doesn't mean a thing to me. Why? Because I won Jesus Christ. That's what I want. Have you won him? Now, he is not a prize for you and I to have, but boy, what he brings that you and I don't have to offer. What he brings that you and I could never give out. Paul said, that's what I want. that excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus. I need to let go of some things personally. I need to let go of some things purposely. He said in Luke 9, 23, you need to deny yourself and take up your cross daily. It is not a one-time deal. Your flesh, if given two minutes, your flesh, if given 10 seconds, will take back over. If you are not on constant guard and watch of your heart and your thoughts, your flesh will take over before you even realize it's taken over. It is a daily thing. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this, when Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. There are different kinds of death, it is true, but the essence of discipleship is contained in these words. The reason we don't follow the way that we should follow is because every day, there are some days I get up and I don't feel like denying myself. And in that day that I don't deny myself, in that day that I don't take up that cross that He wants me to take up, I am not following Him. I then deviate from the path that he has chosen for me, and the issue is this. How long does it take you and I to get back onto the path that he has chosen for us to do, and how much damage do we do to ourselves being on the path that we weren't supposed to be on? I used to snowmobile as a teenager, and it's amazing that I'm alive putting that much power in the hands of a teenager. We loved, we would go out every weekend. We would go out if we could sneak after school. But we had to sneak. And there were many times where up in Michigan, they spend lots of money, which is probably why their roads are so bad. But if you ever want a really nice road, if you go up into upper Michigan up there, just past somewhere right up in here, if you get up past there in Michigan. You'll get that in a second. They have what's called a groomed trail. Mark knows what I'm talking about. He's shaking his head. And a groomed trail. Man, I don't know. It's big. It's at least as wide as that section of pews. And they take those machines that they have, you know, for the ski slopes. Oh, they use those for snowmobile trails. And they groom them. And it's like a six-lane highway, man. But there's speed limits on those. With that speed limit comes a DNR officer. with the power to catch you. And I never got caught. I know what you were thinking. So what we used to do is we used to just go off the trail and find our own trail. And there were many days where that trail, I can think of one day in particular, that the snowmobile that I normally ran, we had studded the track after we got done in the spring riding it, and I hadn't ridden it, and it was the first couple times out after riding it. And the studs in the bottom of a track are just steel studs about that long so you don't slip and slide all over the place and you have good traction. The problem without it is without the studs on there, you can basically, when you're moving with your body, you can kick your snowmobile around like this. And you can slide around corners and do all kinds of neat tricks that we never told my mom about. Just stuff like that. And so with this snow machine, we're running, and we had found a small little track with one trail that we saw people riding on. And so we got on that, and we were headed through the woods, and it was half the size of this aisle. And the snow machine, you know, barely fit in there. And we come around the corner, and I saw my friend go up around the corner in front of me, and there was a large oak tree up there. And so I'm thinking, when I hit up there, I don't need to slow down. I'll keep it at about 40 to 50, and I'll just kick the snowmobile around, and we'll glide around the corner and have a happy day. I got up there, and I went to kick the snowmobile around, and several hundred steel studs said, nah, we're not kicking. So then I began to think, huh, this is very fast, and that tree is very big, and the two of us meeting is not going to be a good meeting at all. And so I thankfully got it to kick some and miss the tree and caught several other little trees along the way. Sometimes your trail isn't the best trail. And if you would just stick on the six-lane highway that millions of dollars of tax dollars are wasted on every year, you'd be fine. See, but there's speed limits there, though. You know, there's people on there telling me what to do. So if I stay on that, then I can't have any fun if I'm on the big trail. So I need to get off the big trail and onto the little trail where I can do what I want and act like an idiot and almost kill myself. Yeah. Purposely, every day, I need to take up that cross. Purposely, every day, I need to let those things go. Paul said, 1 Corinthians 15, 31, I protest by your rejoicing, which I have in Christ Jesus, our Lord, I die daily. Every day, Paul said, I die. I died today. I died this morning. I died this afternoon. Daniel 1.8, but Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king's meat, nor with the wine which he drank. I had this thought today. That is a great verse, that Daniel purposed that in himself. But if we leave that verse right there, that is the majority of Christianity today. How many times have you purposed in yourself that you would not do something again, and that you would stop doing something, and you said, this is the end, I'm not doing it anymore, and tomorrow you do it? Here's what Daniel did. Therefore, because he had purpose in himself, he wasn't gonna do that. Therefore, he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself. Daniel took the steps to get into place the things that would keep him from doing that. And yet so many times God comes to us and said, listen, this needs to stop. And we agree. We're like, yeah, that needs to go. I know I'm not following you. I know I'm not serving you. I know I'm not with you at all. And I need to stop doing that. And I'm not doing it anymore. Till tomorrow morning. Then I'm going to do it again. Why? Because we never take the right steps to put the roadblocks in there so that we don't do it anymore. Purposely, I need to do that. Westcott said this. I don't care for anything else he did, but he said this, and this was good. The mark of a saint is not perfection, but consecration. A saint is not a man without faults, but a man who has given himself without reserve to God. He messed up your Bible for you, but that was good. Follow me, John Butler said this, follow me shows the importance of devotion to Jesus Christ if we are willing to fulfill any kind of calling in his service. The greatness or smallness of our devotion to Christ will determine whether our service will be great or small. Much devotion will do much for Christ. Small devotion will do little for Christ. Knowledge, training and experience all have their part in service. But far exceeding these things in importance is devotion to Christ. for me to live as Christ is an essential attribute for service. If I'm gonna follow, I have to do it. I can't say, I'm gonna follow you, and then somehow I think I am. See, because we get things cleared out, and we get things right, and we keep coming to church, and this was the place where we got the thing right, but away from here, we're not even close to God at all, but somehow, because we keep coming back here, we think we're walking with God, and we think we're following with God, when in fact, God hasn't been in our lives in months. If I'm gonna follow Him, I actually have to do it. Go to John chapter 21. John chapter 21. I love this passage of scripture because it really, once again, explains to you how human Peter really was. I love Peter. He's probably my favorite apostle because he just said whatever he was thinking. Most times it got him into trouble, but he said it anyway. Verse 15. So when they had dined, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my lambs. He saith unto him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep. He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he had said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things, and thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdest thyself, and walkest with her thou wouldest. But when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thine hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee with her thou wouldest not. This spake he, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this, he saith unto him, What? Follow me. Hadn't Peter been following him for three and a half years already? He asked him three times if he loved him. Peter answered, Yes, I do. And he says to him, Feed my lambs, feed my sheep, feed my sheep. Then says to him, Follow me. 20 Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following, which had also leaned upon his breast at supper, and said, Lord, which is he that betrayeth thee? Peter, seeing him, saith unto him, Jesus, Lord, what shall this man do? Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me. The last words Jesus Christ says to His disciples is following. I believe that the last thing He said because He knew more than anything else, that's what you and I would struggle with. Because in our human mind, when we get involved in church and we're around spiritual things and we have a Bible and we talk about spiritual things, a lot of times we equate that with following Him. And following Him is a daily surrender and a daily submission to His thoughts and His way. And it excludes so much of what you and I consider daily life, following Him. He comes up and asks four grown men, follow me. Their response is, yeah. They drop everything they're doing. and they get up and follow him. What do they know about him? I don't know that they knew anything about him. Probably had heard a couple neat things about him. But beyond that, this is an out-of-the-blue question. He comes to Peter. Peter is at the receipt of custom. He says to Peter, follow me. I mean Matthew, sorry. And Matthew says, Well, let me check my daily planner here and see if this all fits into my schedule, and I'll have to have someone to take my spot so that I don't lose... No. What did he do? He followed him. Got up right there, left, and followed. How come it is that people who didn't know anything about him found it so easy to follow him? And yet, you and I, whom he paid for your sin and he paid for my sin, why is it that it is so hard to follow him. When you know, he gave you a book just about him. The subject of this book is him. You probably read this book, I hope, this morning or you'll read it tonight before you go to bed. Why is it so hard to follow? It's hard to follow because we don't like to listen. I don't like to listen. I don't like green eggs and ham either. I don't like to listen. I don't, I don't, I don't like doing it. I don't like leaving things. I don't like letting go of things. I don't like telling myself, you can't do that. You can't go there and you can't be a part of that. Listen, but if God is going to be the part of your life that he desires to be, you are going to have to make the choice that I'm not going to go there. I'm not going to do that. I'm going to follow this path. And it doesn't matter who goes over here. It doesn't matter who goes over there. This is the path that God is walking. And this is the path that I'm going to go down. You make that choice. Nobody made the choice for James and John and Peter and Andrew. Nobody made the choice but they themselves that they were gonna follow. Say, well, I'm saved and I'm in church. Wonderful stuff, but are you following? Listen, if he's over here and you're over there, you're not following. Don't get mad at him because you're lost in the woods. He's got the GPS. He knows where He is going. Get on the path with Him. Walk the path with Him. Say, I've been saved 30 years. Have you been wandering in the woods for 30 years? Listen, it is not a difficult thing to do, except when it comes to the point of me denying myself and taking up that cross and telling myself, no, I like that. I don't like it at all. It makes me upset. but it's why it needs to be done. Peter could follow Jesus Christ, even though Peter was as human as any of us, because Peter could tell himself no, and Peter was willing to take up that cross. Does that mean you stop making mistakes and you stop sinning? No. Peter is the perfect example that you're going to, at the wrong moment, pull out a sword and hack somebody's ear off. You're going to do that. Does that mean you're not following him? No. He just had a dumb moment in life. but you gotta follow. And then to follow, you gotta listen and leave some things and let some things go. Don't count yourself a disciple. Don't count yourself serving if you don't even know where God is. If you don't know, if he didn't speak to you today and you didn't speak to him today, don't count yourself a follower of Jesus Christ. You don't know where he's at. You don't know what he thinks of you today. Probably not good if you haven't talked to him today. Are you following him like you should? Are you following him? Some have come, we'll give them a few minutes to deal with the Lord. Listen, don't fool yourself into thinking that you've got it figured out based on whatever it is that you're thinking right now. Even if you're following, you know you could follow a little bit better. You could take some things and hone them down and make that relationship better. than it is. Being a disciple and being a follower should, at some point in your life, be at the place where you disappear from the equation. It's like they say about a couple that's been married for 40 or 50 years. They just seem so much like each other, and that is so true because they've spent their whole lives just being around and getting to know each other. And listen, if you've been saved a long time, listen, you and Jesus Christ, you ought to be intertwined. Following Him, man, that should be easy. And yet so often it's not because it's so easy to let my flesh control me and tell me which road I want to go down and decide for me what I'm going to do. Jesus used two words when calling His disciples. The two words are, follow me. And they were obeyed. The question is, are you obeying them to the level that you know you should? Once again, nobody else's standard. I don't know how you do it. It's yours. It's between you and God. You know where you're at right now. You know where you're at today. You know better than anybody else how much time you and God have had today. You know what path you need to be on. You know what path you need to be taking. You know what steps tomorrow you need to take. You know what you need to do when you get home from church tonight in your relationship with Jesus Christ. But will you follow? Will you be willing and submitted enough to follow Him? I hope you are, and I pray that you are. Father, we do thank You, God, for an evening to be in Your house. We pray that we have been helped. Jesus, we pray that we'd follow You as we should, and we would follow the examples of Your disciples, God, in the book that You gave us. God, we know that they're good men because you put them in your book and you gave it to us to read and to follow and to take examples from. Pray that we would be wise stewards of our time and our talents and our energy and our service to you. We pray tonight for God, our pastor, Pastor Matt and Pastor John as well, as they're away from us, keep them safe. Give them a time of encouragement. Bless Treasure Valley Baptist Church and God, all their efforts in trying to be some help to some pastors, God, who need it desperately, who need some encouragement. Pray that all the sessions and, God, each evening, God, would be helpful, God, to everyone that's there. Pray that you'd keep us safe as we go from your house. Bless the visitation, God. And I pray that you'd bring us back on Sunday and just keep us safe. We do thank you and love you and praise you. Thank you, Jesus, for dying for us. In Jesus' name, amen.