Introduction

COME AND DIE

What did Jesus mean when He said, “Follow Me”? He certainly wasn’t calling anyone to a life of ease and earthly prosperity.

In the plainest possible terms He frequently made clear that His call to discipleship was a call to self-denial, crucifixion, and daily death (cf. Luke 9:23). Following Him meant dying to self, hating one’s own life in this world, and serving Him (John 12:24-26).

In Luke 14:26-27, He said, “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 carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.”

Difficult demands? Impossible in human terms. Yet those are Jesus’ exact words-unequivocal, unadorned, unmitigated by any explanation or soothing rationalization.

He was sounding a note that is missing from much that passes for evangelism today. His “follow Me” was a call to surrender to His lordship.

“[We preach] Christ Jesus as Lord,” the apostle Paul wrote (2 Cor. 4:5). “Jesus is Lord” was the core of the early church’s confession of faith, the primary nucleus of truth affirmed by every true Christian (1 Cor. 12:3). What must we do to be saved? “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31). “If you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom. 10:9). The lordship of Christ is clearly at the heart of true saving faith.

True salvation produces a heart that voluntarily responds to the ever-awakening reality of Christ’s lordship. Because we are sinful creatures, we can never respond as obediently as we should. We experience pathetic failures or extended periods of spiritual dullness. But if we are true believers, we will not fall back into the cold, hard-hearted, determined unbelief and rebellion of our former state. Those who live like that have no reason to think they have ever been redeemed.

The gospel is a call to faith and genuine faith demands our surrender to Jesus as Lord. Those who would come to Him for salvation must be willing to acquiesce to His sovereign authority. No one who rejects His right to rule can lay claim to Him as Savior. Our Lord had no interest in gathering half-hearted or occasional followers. His hard demands are therefore stressed repeatedly in Scripture. That’s one of several reasons the gospel message is a stumbling block to some and folly to others (1 Cor. 1:23).

But there is a great deal of confusion nowadays regarding the gospel message. The visible church is full of people who want to soften Jesus’ message, remove the stumbling blocks, and make the message sound sophisticated. There is no legitimate way to achieve those goals, and those who try invariably truncate, twist, or trash the biblical message.

Believers must look to Jesus-only Jesus as the starting point, the proper focus, and the anchor of gospel truth. Following Him doesn’t mean adding Him as an adjunct to a list of things we already love and serve. Radical changes are wrought in the hearts and lives of those who truly answer Christ’s call to discipleship. “He is Lord of all” (Acts 10:36), and genuine believers will confess and yield to that truth. Those who treat Him merely as an addendum to their other pastimes and priorities have not yet truly believed in Him.

This book examines the gospel as Christ himself proclaimed it with an eye toward gaining a thorough and proper understanding of the true way of salvation. He is, after all, the one true “author and perfecter of faith” (Heb. 12:2). He is the One (ultimately the only One) to whom we must turn for words of eternal life (John 6:68).

Let’s explore what He had to say about the gospel.