The Way of Giving Up | "The Way" Week 2

In the spring of 1846, 87 men, women and children loaded up everything they owned into covered wagons and they set out from a place called Independence, Missouri to a place called California. And history remembers them and this party known as the Donner Party. They were named after a man named George Donner who was the captain of this wagon train. They were not going to California to seek adventure. They were going for a better future. Like thousands of pioneers before them, they began traveling the well-established California Trail. It wasn't an easy trail, but it was a proven trail. Thousands had made the journey successfully. And along the way, they heard about a shortcut, a lawyer and adventurer by the name of Lansford Hastings had published a guidebook promoting what he called a faster and better route to California. He claimed that it would save them hundreds of miles and weeks of travel. But there was just one little problem. Hastings had never successfully led a wagon train over the terrain that he was recommending. He had explored only portions of the trail from horseback, but he had never proven that families pulling heavy wagons could make the journey. Most experienced pioneers ignored his advice. But one of the respected leaders of this particular wagon train by the name of James Reed became convinced that the shortcut was worth the risk. He persuaded others that it would save them valuable time. And after discussing it together, the group agreed to leave the well-established trail and trust Hastings' new route. At first, it didn't seem like a major decision. It was just one turn, one direction, one shortcut. But the shortcut wasn't a shortcut. Instead of saving time, they spent weeks chopping a new road through the wilderness of the mountains that no wagon trail had ever gone on before. Then they crossed the great Salt Lake Desert, expecting the journey to only take a couple

of days, and it took several weeks. Their oxen died, their wagons broke down, their supplies dwindled. But perhaps what cost them the greatest was precious time. And by the time they finally reached the Sierra Nevada mountains, winter had arrived. Massive snowstorms trapped them in the mountains, and families built crude shelters and waited for rescue. But they ran out of food. Hope faded. And by the time the rescues had reached them months later, nearly half of the party had died, and the remaining party had resorted to cannibalism to survive. It remains one of the great tragedies in American history, but the Donner Party wasn't trying to reach the wrong destination. They were all heading towards a place that everyone was going towards in those days. They just wanted a better life, like everyone else. Their tragedy wasn't where they were going. Their tragedy was who they trusted to get them there. The lesson isn't one of one bad leader ruining the bunch. The lesson is that an entire community agreed to follow a persuasive voice. Last week, if you missed last week, we really started a journey of our own as a church, and I invited you on this journey with me. I stood up here in vulnerability and told you that I was no expert, and that I was going to tell you how to do it. We were going to do it together every single week. And we reviewed the words of Jesus where he said, if you want to be one of my followers. And so we talked about what it means to be a follower of Jesus. What does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus? What does it mean to strive and to work into becoming more and more into the image of Christ? We talked about Christianity and how it's easy to say that we're Christians. I challenged you to make it a practice of coming to church and that is part of our practice. And we talked about how every practice that you do results in an outcome.

We know this in everything in life. If you want to be a golfer, you practice golf. If you want to be a basketball player, you practice basketball. And why would Christianity be any different and that there was a difference? We want to give resources along the way. You can go to victory.church forward slash resources, and you can see writings and articles that coincide with the every week sermon and practices and everyday practices. We're giving circle leaders resources to lead your circles, your groups through. We want to come alongside you to go because we believe that the way matters. That we talked about how we say every single week, we go out by saying we live life to the full, but what does that mean? And it's more than just saying it. There are practices that lead us to a life of fullness in Christ, and what do those practices look like every single day. And we're gonna, every single week, talk about a very practical practice that as Christians we should practice. And we're gonna give tools every week to help you come alongside and help us to become better and better at becoming more and more like Jesus. I'm starting this week with probably the most difficult practice of them all. And I'm actually a little nervous. I'm actually a little nervous to share this one first because by sharing this one first, I risk losing all of you before we ever even get started. But it has to be this way. Because before we get to any of the practices,

it starts with something much harder. It starts with something far more important. It starts with a foundation. And many Christians have the wrong mentality in life which impacts their daily practices of walking in the ways of Jesus. And every practice, I don't mean to overemphasize this, but every practice that we're gonna talk about all the way up until November 1st, every single practice that we're going to talk about hinges on the mentality of today's message. Not to put pressure on myself. Like the Donner Party, California was their destination. But they found out the hard way that the way that they got there matters. And I think the same is true with us as believers, that there is a way. And Jesus said, I am the way. I am the truth. I am the life. And we're gonna review this passage that we started in just a little bit ago. My fear is that cultural Christianity that we all succumb to, myself included, cultural Christianity wants to tell us that there are shortcuts to life to the full. In Luke chapter nine, this is kind of our foundational passage that we will review and discuss from week to week. But this really is the foundational text

because it is the words of Jesus. And as we read it, you'll begin to see how serious Jesus was. Luke chapter nine, verse 23. This is Jesus. He says, he says to the crowd, if any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way. Take up your cross daily and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. And what will you benefit if you gain the whole world but are yourself lost or destroyed? This message will be probably one of the more simple messages you've ever heard, but probably one of the most difficult messages you've ever heard to actually do it, myself included. The simplicity of the message, I'm just going to let the words of Jesus give us our two points today. And they're right there on the page. In fact, verse 23, he says, if you want to be one of my followers, the first thing you have to do is you have to give up your own way. Look at your neighbor and say, give up. Point number one, real simple. Guess what point number one is? Give up your own way. Give up your own way.

In fact, many of the translations that you might be more familiar with if you've been in church or you've read scriptures before, the NLT says, give up your own way. Many of the other translations say it far more bluntly. Many of the translations, just Jesus comes right out and says, deny yourself. Deny yourself. I like to go a bit deeper at times and kind of see what the original language that this was written in. And this word deny in the Greek is the Greek word aparniomi. And it means to forget oneself, to lose sight of oneself and one's own interest. But if you go one layer deeper, there's a root word that even drills down even another layer deeper. The root word of the word deny is the root word, the Greek word, aparniomi. And it means to renounce, to disown, to refuse association with. I like that last one. To refuse association with. In fact, if you're familiar with the story of Peter, whenever Jesus is arrested, and the Bible says that Peter denied Jesus three times. Same exact root Greek word used to describe Peter's denial of Jesus. And Jesus uses the same vernacular, the same wording. to talk to us when it comes to being a follower of him.

He says, I want you to renounce association with yourself. I expected a lot of quiet today, and I'm not taken back by it, it's okay. Last week we asked this really simple question, is who are you becoming? Last week, that was the question we asked, who are we becoming? This series isn't about who you were, it's not about who you are. The question that we challenged ourselves with last week was who are you becoming? And what we talked about last week is your practices, daily practices will always reveal who you're becoming. This week, the question even drills down a little deeper. This week, we're gonna wrestle with this question, well, who's making those decisions? Who are we becoming? Well, who's making the decisions on who we're becoming? I find it very interesting that one of the very first challenges that Jesus gave his disciples, he says, if you wanna be one of my followers, what he doesn't say, he says, he doesn't say you have to deny sin. You would think that would be more like what Jesus would say. Hey, deny sin, run from sin, Jesus is like, the first thing I want you to know is not to deny sin, I actually need you to do something way more difficult. Say no to you, say no to yourself.

Far more challenging, far more difficult to do. In fact, in verse 24, the very next verse, Jesus says something that is just completely haywire and completely upside down to something that we would think on a day-to-day basis, verse 24. It says, if you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you, same terminology, give up, give up. If you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. Let's do the same thing. Let's look at the Greek, okay, let's look at the, let's drill down in a little bit deeper level. So this word hang on, some translations say save. Some translations say, if you wanna save your life, you gotta lose it. If you keep on trying to hang on and save your life, you're actually going to lose it. But if you lose it for my sake, you'll actually find it. So this word save or hang on is the same Greek word for salvation in the New Testament. The Greek word sozo, and it means to save from suffering, to make well, to heal, to restore to health, to preserve. And isn't that funny that Jesus is saying, if you try to preserve yourself, if you try to save yourself from suffering, you'll actually suffer. And then he goes on to say, but if you'll give up, if you'll just give up, if you'll lose your life for my sake, which is the Greek word polymy, and it means to destroy, to abolish, to render useless,

to declare that one must be put to death. I wanna pause for a second and make a really important disclosure. I'm big on disclosures because I think that sometimes when I preach or when preachers preach, we say something, but we realize that by not saying something, we're actually saying something. And if you grew up in a church or a home where there was a lot of religion, a lot of performance, a lot of earning your way into the kingdom, and you have to do the right things and be the right things, and if you check all the boxes, then you're being a Christian, that is not what Jesus is saying. Jesus is not saying, if you wanna be one of my followers, you have to be miserable. I don't think that's what Jesus is saying. Self-denial is not the destination that God is trying to get us to go to. He's not saying, if you're doing it right, you're miserable. In the same way that the Donner Party was heading west to a better life, it wasn't about that place, it was about the way in which they got there. And Jesus is saying, if you want to get to life to the full, if you really wanna save your life, there are no shortcuts, there are no easy ways, there are no ways to cut away pain. And I bet you, if you asked the Donner Party today, if they were here, they would say,

if you could retrace your steps, would you rather go the long way? And they would say yes. And Jesus is saying these words, Jesus isn't glorifying misery. Jesus is not follow me because I want you to be miserable. He's saying, you're misunderstanding how life works. And for some reason in God's kingdom, everything's always upside down. And I don't like that. I feel like God needs my help to be like, hey, God, to make this more palatable to Christians, and we actually need to grow and multiply. So could we just kinda, could we not turn our other cheek? That's kinda, no one wants to do that. Could we not go the extra mile? You know, if someone asked me to carry it, I'd go an extra mile. Could we just, and Jesus is just giving this thing that has to be so mind blowing as it is to us today. He's saying if you, in our culture, holding on to something means you save it, right? It works with money, it works with your thoughts, it works with your relationships, makes sense. If you hold on to money, you know what that means? You're saving it. And if you lose money, you see what I'm saying? And Jesus comes along and says, no, in my kingdom, it's the complete opposite, okay? If you hold on, you're actually gonna lose it.

But if you'll give up, if you'll deny yourself, if you will give up your way, you're actually going to save. You're actually going to save yourself. And so, one of the hardest words we're gonna learn in this season, okay? It's a hard word, a lot of words, a lot of Christianese. If you've grown up in church, there's a lot of Christianese, you know? Say yes to Jesus, you know, all these things we say. The hardest word in the Christian life, what I'm presenting to you today and how we're gonna walk out these practices, isn't saying yes to Jesus. Hardest thing you'll ever do is to say no to you. Saying yes to Jesus is actually quite easy because he's already paid the price. The Bible says we're saved by grace through faith, not by works, lest any man boast. And that's why it's really important to have disclaimers where I say, as we try to become more and more like Jesus, you know what that doesn't mean? It doesn't mean that the better you get at being Jesus, the more he loves you. That's not how this works. Jesus loves you as much right now as he will ever love you. The Bible says that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. This is not about earning love, it's not about some pecking order in the church,

and if you're good, you belong, and if you don't, it has nothing to do with that. It has this thing that's like, no, I'm a follower. I don't wanna just be, I don't want Jesus to just be my savior. I want him to be my Lord. I want him to be my Lord. And the way Paul writes about it, he says by the power of the Holy Spirit, I want to become more and more like Jesus. I wanna become more and more into the image of Christ. It's not about misery, it's not about hating yourself, it's not about being shameful if you forget to read your Bible today. It's nothing of the sort that's legalism, that's religion, that's not what we're talking about. What we're saying is when I say no to myself, when I deny myself, when I give up my way, what I'm saying is my desires, my feelings, my plans automatically become his direction, not mine. It's not about how I feel, it's not about what I wanna do. And so, I'm right there with y'all. I'm right there with you. Because I know what I want. I know what I want. I wanna be right. You know what I wanna do? I wanna gossip, it's super fun to gossip. It's so fun.

I mean, I wanna come home to Michelle and be like, you'll get the popcorn, you're never gonna believe what I heard today. Sit down, I can't wait to tell you, it's amazing. You know what I like? I want revenge. That's what I want. I want revenge. I want recognition. I want comfort. And this is Jesus drilling down to the core of our sin nature and saying, you know, the hardest thing you'll ever do as a Christian is not put a Bible verse in your profile pic or wear a cross around your neck or get a cross tattoo on your back. The hardest thing you will ever do in your Christian walk is to look yourself in the mirror and say, no. I deny myself, I deny myself. I deny myself. The second thing he says is it doesn't get any easier, y'all point number two is like, we're doubling down. He says, if you wanna be one of my followers, you have to deny yourself, you have to give up your own way. And then he says, and take up your cross daily, follow me. So number one, we're gonna give up our own way. Number two, we're gonna take up his way. It's pretty simple. This word take up in the Greek is the Greek word,

Iroh, and it means to take upon oneself to carry what has been raised up. And the fascinating thing to me is when Jesus looks at his disciples and says, if you wanna be one of my followers, if you wanna be one of my followers, there's only two requirements. You gotta deny yourself and you gotta take up your cross. And we just think about that through the lens of, well, yeah, that's what Jesus did. Jesus picked up his cross and died on the cross. But we have to remember that the time for this chronologically, he's looking his disciples in the eyes and they do not know that he's about to do that. They have no context. Their only context for picking up a cross is what they witnessed every day on the streets of Jerusalem, when the Romans would crucify criminals. Imagine how windblown. and you would feel like your rabbi, your messiah, says, here's what I want you to do. I want you to pick up your cross every day. And I just, I'm trying to imagine what it would feel like as a disciple, not knowing that that's what Jesus was gonna do and being like, well, what does that even mean? What does it mean to pick up my cross? I don't even know what that means. And then all of a sudden it hit me

that this idea of self-denial is something internal. You will deny yourself here first or here first. It's internal. You will make that decision. No one will know you're making that decision, okay? It's internal. But picking up a cross, that's public. Everyone witnesses it. Everyone sees it. And Jesus is like making this duality. He's like, hey, if you wanna be one of my followers, it's not just on the inside. You gotta live your life in a way that it's apparent to everyone around you that it's both internal and external. It's both. Self-denial is inward. Cross-carrying is outward. And Jesus, before Jesus ever said, okay, sit down, let me teach you how to pray. Jesus, let me teach you how to die. Let me teach you how to die to your flesh. But Galatians says that your spirit and your flesh are constantly at war with one another. And Jesus is saying, I want you to kill your flesh so that your spirit can thrive. So the way to life to the full and the spirit is through death. Matthew 28, this is one of the last paragraphs from the Gospel of Matthew.

He's about to go up to heaven. In verse 18, he says, Jesus came to them and told, who did he tell? His disciples. He said, I've been given all authority in heaven and on earth, therefore, go and make disciples, duplicate yourself, of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We usually stop there. That's usually where we stop with the Great Commission, even on coffee mugs, and when we say it, we stop right there. So all we have to do to make disciples is to baptize them? No, because the very next verse says, teach these new disciples to obey half of the commandments. You know, the ones they're comfortable with. The ones that fit into their lifestyle. The ones that they're okay with. The ones that fit into the life that they live. No, he says, I want you to teach them to obey all the commandments that I give them. It's important. It's obedience, and many times, I just think that well-meaning Christians, including this one, including this one, we've tried to correct God's upside-down kingdom. We've tried to fix it for God. It's like, God, we're not gonna be able to grow the church

and get more Christians with all this deny-yourself stuff and pick up your cross. Can we just water it down just a little bit? Isn't there a shortcut? Surely. Surely, the journey to life to the full, surely, we can just kinda pick and choose what we want. And I'm just realizing that we've, we, and I don't say you, I say we, we have tried to get the benefits of Jesus without embracing, fully embracing the way of Jesus. And I cannot start preaching to you about practices until I first convince all of us, including myself, that the only way to legitimately follow the way of Jesus is to deny ourselves. And if you don't like this sermon, then you don't like Jesus. I'm kidding, that was mean. But how more plain could it be? Jesus says, hey, it's your choice, because he uses the word if. By saying the word if, he means you get to choose. But if you want to be one of my followers, there's only two requirements. Deny yourself, pick up your cross, and follow me. This is challenging, because I would rather have peace without prayer, and I would rather have wisdom and understanding without trials. I don't like that verse.

You know, blessed are you when you suffer trials of many kind. You're like, what are you talking about? Upside down kingdom, upside down kingdom. I don't know exactly what this journey looks like, but I'm willing to go on it with you. And I do think that there is a destination that God has for every one of us, individually, but also, Corporately as a church that he's taking us on a journey and I what I'm convinced of more than ever is that the destination is glorious It is it is the California to the Donner party now. We would not call California paradise anymore these days But the pun works the metaphor works The place that God is going to take us to will be well worth the way The way but it's gonna take discipline it's gonna take practice and when we mess up guess what it's just practice We're practicing. None of us will ever get this perfectly well and right on this side of heaven. So relax relax But there are no shortcuts I Fear that if we tried to do the practices without coming with the right frame of mind All we're going to do is to create a bunch of religious people That create this pecking order system of well, did you read your Bible today? And how many times did you fast today? And how many times did you this all for the wrong reasons and it's like Paul in in second Timothy I'll close with this and second Timothy Paul kind of paints this picture and it's like the the Holy Spirit had given him a picture Into the future of what I believe is today and what we're seeing in cultural Christianity Second Timothy chapter 3 verse 1. He says you should know this Timothy that in the last days There will be very difficult times For people will love only themselves and their money and they will be boastful and proud scoffing at God Disobedient to their parents. I like it that he threw that one in to hear that kids just make it sure and Ungrateful now listen to this they will consider nothing sacred

They will be unloving and unforgiving they will slander others and have no self-control It'll be cruel and hate what is good They will betray their friends and be reckless be puffed up with pride and love pleasure rather than God and then verse 5 tells the results They will act religious But they will reject the power that could make them godly Stay away from people like that Paul said and what I would add not that I can add to the Bible But if I could I would say and don't become people like that This is the danger Of trying to walk out the Christian life and pretend like we're Christians without fulfilling what Jesus says and denying yourself so Every week I'm gonna try to give you a very very practical Exercise for the week. Okay, most of the time they'll be kind of physical in nature We may be praying right we may worship we may fast and every single week We'll do a little bit of a different practice and a rhythm Because we're what we're becoming we're becoming something and our practices will always reveal what we're becoming This week's practice is more is more spiritual in nature It's gonna be something that we we ask the Lord to give us every single week Okay, so here's what my challenge to you is every single day We're gonna ask the Lord to help us. We're gonna ask the Lord to help us fulfill what Jesus says his followers do Okay, so every day we're gonna just simply say Jesus is the Lord Every day, we're gonna just simply say Jesus today. Help me to give up my way And take up your way That's it. John. Yeah It's practice Practice, we're gonna practice. We're gonna practice. We're gonna practice. We're gonna practice. So here's what I want you to do I want you to you never had a pastor tell you this I want you to pull out your phone right now get your phone out If you're old school and you got a paper calendar pull it out. All right, we won't make fun of you today. That's tomorrow Pull out whatever you use and what i'm gonna challenge you to do is Listen, you won't do it. If you don't practice And you won't practice if you don't remind yourself to practice

So I want you to make a calendar invite or a reminder in your phone that will notify you every day It could be a 6 a.m. It could be a 9 a.m. It could be a 9 p.m All the holy people it'll be like 6 a.m. Because that's when I get up But you're going to simply put a calendar reminder That reminds you that day to say jesus today I give up my way And I pick up your way Take up your way And it's going to remind us throughout the day every day before I spend the money Lord I I lay down my way I give up my way to on spending money and I take up your way Before I respond to my spouse I give up my way and I take up your way before I make the decision before you make the post before you Make the decision at work before you just discipline your kids before you send the email before you sign the contract Before you quit before you complain, whatever it is. Jesus remind me today To give up my way And to take up your way Okay, we're going to deny ourselves ourselves, and we always say we want revival in America, but revival doesn't always just begin in a church service. I would present to you that it begins when God's people has revival in their hearts, and revival starts, I believe I can say this, based on what Jesus said, perhaps revival starts when we deny ourselves, pick up our cross. So in just a few moments, we're gonna receive communion, we're gonna participate in Eucharist, and do you know what communion is? Practice, it's a spiritual practice, is what communion is. Jesus told us to do it, he didn't say if you do it,

remember me, he says when you do it, remember me. It's a practice, the reason we're doing it today is Jesus said remember, he's saying remember what I did, and it's not just about remembering what he did, although it is that, it's also remembering what he did as a picture and a model for what, Jesus didn't ask us to do something that he didn't first do. If you wanna be one of my followers, what do you have to do? Deny yourself, guess what Jesus did? Denied himself, the Bible says that he stripped himself of glory, he stripped himself of deity, and he stepped into heaven full flesh. That's denial, that is self-denial. And then he asks us to pick up our cross and follow him, why? Because he did it first, he picked up a cross, picked up a cross, and he walked to his death, why? So that we could live free and have life abundantly, abundantly, life to the full. We deserve death, but all we have to die to is our flesh. So we're gonna participate in communion in just a couple of moments at all of our campuses. Based on the current time, it's about nine after, and we usually let out at 15 after. So we're gonna go into a little bit of overtime today, all right, maybe just five minutes or so, gonna go a little long. I always say when we do, we don't go to overtime very often, but when we do, it's like a sporting event, you don't wanna leave in overtime,

that's when the game gets good. So I guess also I'm asking you to practice denying yourself and the buffet can wait just 10 minutes, you know? Before we, we're gonna go into worship, I'll give you instructions on how to get the elements. Before we do that, is it okay if I just ask you to bow your heads and close your eyes? Because I don't wanna focus on the way without giving someone an opportunity to join this family of believers. So we're all, if you're here today, we're all practicing the way, we're all trying to become more and more like Jesus, and there's not a single person in this room that's perfected that, and none of us will this side of heaven, but we're inviting you to come and join us on this journey. But you first have to accept Jesus into your heart, that's the easiest thing, that's saying yes to Jesus. We're all in this season of trying to say no to ourselves, but we too at one point said yes to Jesus, and that's just saying, Jesus, I need you to be my Lord and Savior. The Bible says that that is by grace through faith, you don't earn it, you couldn't earn it, it's the easiest thing you'll ever do is accept Jesus into your heart, and then living for Jesus will be one of the most difficult things you ever do, and one of the most rewarding things you'll ever do.

So if you're here today and you don't have a relationship with Jesus, but you wanna go on this journey with all of us in this room, and you don't have a personal relationship with Jesus, I'm gonna ask you at all of our campuses, just on the count of three, I'm gonna say shoot your hand up, and at all of our campuses, you're gonna shoot your hand up, ready? On the count of three, don't hesitate, don't overthink it, I want you to respond to the inner voice that you're sensing and feeling, because that is the Holy Spirit. You perhaps are hearing from the Lord for the first time in your life. So if you're here today and you wanna give your life completely to Jesus and surrender to him, I want you to raise your hand on the count of three, ready, one, two, three, just shoot your hand up, yep. Hands right here, hands in the back, hands over here, waving them around, lots of hands, keep them up, we wanna count, we wanna celebrate, hands down the front, hands on the left, several hands over here, hand in the back, I see all those hands across the back, anybody on my right, yeah, all the way in the back, I see you, God bless you, yep, right there on the back row,

I see you, God bless you, yes, awesome, I see you, bro, I see you, both of you, right there by each other, awesome, I see you right here, awesome, praise God, amen, amen, okay, you can put your hands down, saw you right there too, young lady, anybody else say that's me, you haven't raised your hand yet, but you're sensing that you need to, anybody else say that's me, just shoot your hand up real high, I see you, I see you right here on the front, yep, another hand down here, another hand right here, okay, so this is the easiest decision you'll ever make in your life, Bible says in Romans 10 that we confess, with our mouth and we believe in our heart that Jesus is our Savior, Jesus is Lord. The Bible says you're saved and then you're gonna go on a journey with the rest of us and we'll give you some instructions in just a minute like I just gave my life to Jesus now what we got resources for you we're gonna come alongside you but it starts with declaring something from our mouth so everyone say this with me say Father God thank you for sending Jesus to die for me Jesus I receive you as my Lord and Savior I invite you into my heart would you lead me and guide me you are the way the truth and the life in Jesus name amen church can we celebrate that isn't that good news we're so grateful that you joined us today at victory we pray big prayers to a big God and we expect big results if you would like to receive prayer you can submit a prayer request by visiting victory church slash pray if this message or any of our messages have impacted your life and you would like to partner with us through giving you can do so at victory church slash give thank you again for joining us at victory church we live life to the full