Now great multitudes went with Him. And He turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it—lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, “This man began to build and was not able to finish.” (Luke 14:25-30 NKJV)
The Lord Jesus expresses in no uncertain terms the potential cost of turning to Him in repentance and faith. Mothers, fathers, wives, children and peoples’ love for their own lives are listed together as potential obstacles to people coming to the Lord. Conversion to Christ (in the Biblical sense of the phrase) means the total surrender of one’s whole life to Him. Such devotion to Christ is guaranteed to cause conflict with other relationships such as mother, father, wife, and child unless they too turn to Christ. Devotion to Christ at certain times in history and in specific parts of the world today has meant choosing between living and dying.
This potential “cost” is what the Lord is saying that we must take into consideration when deciding whether or not to respond to Him in faith. Jesus gave the Disciples time to “count the cost” because at first, they didn’t fully grasp what they were doing. We know historically only Judas, and John avoided martyrdom. Judas committed suicide and John died an old man after years of persecution. Persecution and death awaited them when they turned to Christ.
There is another option that seems to be missing from our text. It’s not a legitimate option, but it is a popular one. I could summarize it as merely turning to Christ (more or less) in name only. Don’t get too serious about serving Christ. Don’t repent of your sins and ultimately surrender. Find out what’s the bare minimum to receive forgiveness for sins and go forward (more or less) as a nominal Christian. We even have a term for it, “carnal Christian.” How could such an approach to Christianity become so popular?
I attended a training session to serve as a counselor for a very popular Evangelist who was coming to our town in 2005. One thing that stuck out was the instruction we received “not to dwell too much on the negative.” True story. Having read training manuals for counseling anxious sinners from the late 1800s and early 1900s I can tell you something drastic had changed. There was no longer an emphasis on selling out to God in true repentance and faith. The class I attended could truly be called “how to make a nominal Christian.” At best the approach would garner nominal church attendees.
Have you wondered why it seems that in the last 30 years there have been so few people in the Western World who seem to have a heart for God? Why are so so few burning for Him? Why did it seem that 50 years ago there was much fruit in ministry, but today not so much? Why do most young believers express their faith almost exclusively through singing? Is there any continuity between what we read about in the Gospels and the book of Acts and the version of Christianity that dominates our times? I suggest that it is impossible to have genuine fruit in ministry unless we preach the Gospel as it was handed down to us so that the Holy Spirit will convict sinners of their sin. Once under conviction, we must instruct “anxious sinners” to seek the Lord earnestly in prayer for salvation. To do anything different is to fool ourselves. We leave the lost without the pathway they need to have any chance of finishing a life for Christ in faith.
A Tower
Jesus uses the analogy of building a tower. Our passage asks us to consider what would happen if a man laid the foundation of a tower and then afterward was not able to complete it because he did not count the cost. In other words, they began living for Christ (more or less) and ended up falling short of completion. He gives another analogy following these verses in Luke 14:25-30 regarding an army surrendering because they didn’t count the cost. Failure to finish a tower or win a battle is one thing, but what about backsliding and surrendering to the Devil? That’s the essence of the analogy.
Our tower passage existed for over 1900 years as a valuable lesson that in itself was fully capable of revealing the mind of God on the subject. And yet I believe, that in the mind of God, He knew that the day would come when just such an event would genuinely come to pass: not in an age where multitudes were measured in hundreds and thousands; but in billions.
Consider that in Akron, Ohio (the city where A.W. Tozer was converted) stands a giant unfinished concrete television tower that is the mocking-stock of a highly popular and respected evangelical minister the late Rex Humbard. I stood at the foot of it in 2016. On an evangelistic tour in Canada, Humbard saw the 626-foot Calgary Tower and decided he would duplicate it near Akron. At over 700 feet tall, it was designed to be the highest structure in Ohio. Humbard intended it to include a restaurant, television studio, and an observation deck. It was never completed. This concrete and steel structure, though nearly forty years old, is still the source of countless crude jokes. It is a giant concrete cell phone tower today
When was the last time you turned on your favorite Television Minister and fell under conviction of the Holy Spirit? When was the last time you heard anyone preach in such a way that you came under deep distress for your sins and earnestly sought the Lord on your knees for forgiveness? Do you ever recall being told that coming to Christ means taking up your cross (the means of your own death) and following Him to whatever end? If the answer is “I can’t recall” or “never” the reason is that counting the cost is no longer part of converting to Christ. It’s not preached because of the nominal nature of what is frequently passed off as Christianity. Mothers, fathers, wives, children and peoples’ love for their own lives are not threatened by a modern mundane and carnal expression of Christianity. There is such little change afterward that life goes on as if nothing ever happened.
Now great multitudes went with Him. And He turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it—lest, after he has laid the foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, “This man began to build and was not able to finish.” (Luke 14:25-30 NKJV)
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