{"id":15267,"date":"2024-03-23T17:09:47","date_gmt":"2024-03-23T11:39:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cccfornews.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/23\/the-promise-jesus-offers-to-those-who-leave-everything-behind\/"},"modified":"2024-03-23T17:09:47","modified_gmt":"2024-03-23T11:39:47","slug":"the-promise-jesus-offers-to-those-who-leave-everything-behind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cccfornews.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/23\/the-promise-jesus-offers-to-those-who-leave-everything-behind\/","title":{"rendered":"The Promise Jesus Offers to Those Who Leave Everything Behind"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Jesus and Community<\/h2>\n

In Mark 10, Jesus gives us this staggering promise: Jesus said, <\/p>\n

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\u201cTruly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.\u201d (Mark 10:29\u201330) <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What we leave.<\/em> Jesus is always honest, even blunt, about the cost of discipleship. He never buries suffering in the small print. He wants us to know that following him will be hard. <\/p>\n

Here he takes it for granted we\u2019ll leave dear things and people behind to follow him. The fact is, we can\u2019t turn to<\/em> him without also turning from<\/em> other things. All Christians bear some cost in following Jesus, though we may not always see it. Rosaria Butterfield once said, \u201cWe may never know the treacherous journey people have taken to land in the pew next to us.\u201d1<\/sup> It\u2019s one of the reasons we need to go easy on each other; we just don\u2019t see all people are going through. We don\u2019t see the price they may be paying just to show up at church. <\/p>\n

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\n <\/p>\n

\"You're<\/p>\n

<\/a>\n <\/div>\n

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\n <\/p>\n

Ray Ortlund<\/a>, <\/p>\n

Sam Allberry<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/em>
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In this practical guide, seasoned pastors Ray Ortlund and Sam Allberry help weary leaders renew their love for ministry by equipping them to build a gospel-centered culture into every aspect of their churches.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Jesus knows that the costliest things to leave will be relational. He foresees believers losing their kin, their homes, their very sense of belonging to follow him. Thankfully, that\u2019s not the case for many of us, but there will be some from certain backgrounds for whom allegiance to Jesus will mean they\u2019re no longer welcome in their community. Yet even when the cost is so high, Jesus assures us he\u2019s worth it. <\/p>\n

This should never cease to amaze us. The instinct of so many is to feel that nothing is more important than family. Even in the West, we still think this way. But along comes Jesus, and quite unselfconsciously says \u201cI am\u201d (see John 8:48, for example). He audaciously claims to supersede the most significant human relationships we have in this life. He eclipses all others. He assumes he\u2019s more compelling than all of them, even all of them combined. We\u2019re used to the deep bonds of loyalty that exist in many families, and to the intoxication that overwhelms young lovers. But Jesus says he exceeds both, that he is more captivating, enthralling, and urgent<\/em> than all others. Having all the friendship, family, and romantic fulfillment we could possibly imagine and desire without Jesus would not be worth it.<\/p>\n

What we receive.<\/em> But when we follow Jesus, we don\u2019t just get Jesus on his own. Whatever relational cost following Jesus might incur, he also wants us to know that following him is worth it in this life, not just in the age to come. Even in the present age, we\u2019ll receive back from Jesus far, far more than we leave behind. The hardest cost for following Jesus is familial and relational, but, in a similar way, it\u2019s familial and relational blessings that he promises us. <\/p>\n

You will have houses: homes in which you\u2019re welcome, places where people truly get you, where you feel most understood. Lands where you deeply feel you belong. You\u2019ll have family: people who are given to you as fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. And lest his promises sound utterly idealized, there will be a side order of persecutions too\u2014whether or not we ordered them. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to overstate the grandeur of what Jesus is saying here. Whatever is to our relational loss in coming to Jesus and following him will be made up for by a couple orders of magnitude. Jesus promises that with him we\u2019ll never be relationally out of pocket. He\u2019s not even promising that whatever we lose, he\u2019ll give us a bit more; he\u2019s promising us a hundredfold return!<\/em><\/p>\n

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Having all the friendship, family, and romantic fulfillment we could possibly imagine and desire without Jesus would not be worth it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Jesus doesn\u2019t promise health and wealth. He doesn\u2019t promise a life without hardship where everything only gets better and easier. He does<\/em> promise deep and rich community, the likes of which we\u2019d never have without him. <\/p>\n

A friend of mine (Sam\u2019s) came to faith from a Muslim background. He knew he\u2019d most likely be rejected by his family if he became a Christian. It\u2019s a horrific cost, unimaginable to so many of us. But think about what Jesus promises my friend: more community and family than he had before, not less. This doesn\u2019t mean the pain of what he lost would easily go away, but it does mean that alongside that painful loss is a hundredfold gain. <\/p>\n

Let us marvel at the generous provision of Christ. He cares about this side of life. Having thick community matters to him. He wants us to have people to be friends with and to do life with, and he wants it so much he promises to provide it. By promising it so explicitly and emphatically, Jesus is staking his reputation here. If his promise isn\u2019t true, then Jesus isn\u2019t true. But we mustn\u2019t miss the implications for us and our churches. We\u2019re not bystanders, passively looking on as Jesus makes this promise to abandoned disciples. We are not only the people to whom the promise is made (inasmuch as the gospel has had relational cost in our own lives). No, we are the fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters Jesus promises. <\/p>\n

What we provide.<\/em> Often Jesus\u2019s promises are such that only he can fulfill them. When he promises the thief on the cross, \u201cToday you will be with me in paradise\u201d (Luke 23:43), or says, \u201cWhoever comes to me I will never cast out\u201d (John 6:37), we don\u2019t roll up our sleeves to help out. These are things only Jesus can accomplish, commitments only he can fulfill. <\/p>\n

But the promise in Mark 10 is different. We are the hundredfold blessing he promises. <\/p>\n

Jesus offers our homes and lands to others. In J. R. R. Tolkien\u2019s The Hobbit<\/em>, a succession of dwarfs interrupts Bilbo Baggins\u2019s domestic peace and tranquility. The dwarfs presume they can avail themselves of his food and hospitality. As the story unfolds, it emerges that the wizard Gandalf, without seeking Bilbo\u2019s prior approval, had scratched a magic invitation for the dwarfs on the hobbit\u2019s front door!2<\/sup> <\/p>\n

Jesus does something very similar to our homes. If we\u2019re his disciples, the places where we dwell are no longer exclusively ours. We\u2019re to share them with those to whom Jesus makes this Mark 10 promise. We must be willing for others to barge in and help themselves to the contents of our pantry. He has promised them our home and land. <\/p>\n

Let\u2019s not congratulate ourselves on being philanthropic. Jesus\u2019s call means we will need to move beyond our comfort levels. Something in us will be diminished if we don\u2019t. But it isn\u2019t just what we have. It\u2019s who we are that is bound up in his promise. Jesus offers us to others. He mentions three generations: the one going before us (mothers and fathers<\/em>), our own (brothers and sisters<\/em>), and the one ahead (children<\/em>). To each we are to be family. <\/p>\n

Thinking of the generation that has come before us, we\u2019re to ask, Who can we be a son or daughter to? Who can we look up to and learn from? Who will have more wisdom than us about life in God\u2019s world? Of our own generation, Who could we walk alongside as a Christian brother or sister? Who can we encourage and be encouraged by? And of the generation ahead of us, Who is there we have some wisdom to share with? Who could we be a spiritual father or mother to?<\/p>\n

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\n Notes:<\/strong>\n <\/p>\n

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  1. Rosaria Butterfield, \u201cHomosexuality and the Christian Faith.\u201d Breakout talk given at The Gospel Coalition\u2019s 2014 National Women\u2019s Conference, June 29, 2014. Available online at https:\/\/www.thegospelcoalition.org\/conference_media\/homosexuality -christian-faith\/.<\/li>\n
  2. I\u2019m grateful to Pastor T. J. Tims for this analogy.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n

    This article is adapted from<\/em> You\u2019re Not Crazy: Gospel Sanity for Weary Churches<\/a> by Ray Ortlund and Sam Allberry.<\/em><\/p>\n

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    \"Sam<\/p>\n

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    Sam Allberry<\/strong> is the associate pastor at Immanuel Nashville. He is the author of various books, including What God Has to Say about Our Bodies <\/em>and Is God Anti-Gay?<\/em>; and the cohost of the podcast You\u2019re Not Crazy: Gospel Sanity for Young Pastors<\/em>. He is a fellow at the Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n

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    \"Ray<\/p>\n

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    Ray Ortlund<\/strong> is the president of Renewal Ministries, the pastor to pastors at Immanuel Nashville Church, and a canon theologian with the Anglican Church in North America. He is the author of several books, including Marriage and the Mystery of the Gospel<\/em>; The Death of Porn<\/em>; and the Preaching the Word commentaries on Isaiah and Proverbs. He is also a contributor to the ESV Study Bible<\/em>. Ray and his wife, Jani, have been married for fifty years.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n

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