Transcript

Let’s go to Luke 18 as we continue going through the Gospel of Luke and in God’s Providence he has given us today a text that beautifully unfolds right into the principle and the importance and meaning of the Lord’s table. Luke 18, we’ll look at verses 28 through 30. Luke 18, beginning in verse 28,

28 Peter said, “Behold, we have left our own homes and followed You.” 29 And He [Jesus] said to them, “Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, 30 who will not receive many times as much at this time and in the age to come, eternal life.”

I’ve entitled this “My Reconstructed Family.” The moment you’re converted, God begins to reconstruct you. The moment you believe on Christ, justification is secured. You stand as just before God in the merits and righteousness of Jesus Christ but at that moment, sanctification begins in your life. You begin to be made more Christlike. You begin to learn to love God and the treasures of heaven more than you love this world and the treasures of this world. You begin to walk by the wisdom of God revealed in Scripture rather than the emotions and the whims and the fallen wisdom that rules this world. You begin a reconstruction the moment you are converted. We know the laboratory for the reconstruction, the arena is God’s local church. That’s the centerpiece of how God grows us and matures us, reconstructs us.

But not only that, he made us as social beings. We are meant to dwell in harmony and in fellowship with a congregation, a family, a body it’s called in Scripture. And from the moment you’re converted, God begins to reconstruct your human relationships. He just begins to do that. New relationships are developed. New people are met and you begin to find out, “I have a connection with them spiritually that is so special and it is so wonderful.” Then you find that old relationships often start fading. There doesn’t always have to be an enmity or a hatefulness but you find some relationships begin to separate off. Sometimes folks do separate with a hateful spirit about your commitment to Christ but what God is doing is he is reconstructing you into a new family setting. It’s always been this way. It always has been this way, is this way and always will be this way in true Christian living and in a true Christian church.

Let’s look at the way the Lord teaches this in Luke 18:28-30. I. In this reconstructed family life I’m a part of, there is a downside. I might add, at least from our temporal human perspective, there is a downside. It’s not a whole lot of fun. You remember the context: Jesus has been talking to a man who the Bible says is extremely wealthy. For this particular man, he pointed out the idol this man must release from his heart if he’s going to be a follower of Christ and that was his wealth. The man could not do that, the Bible says, because he was so extremely wealthy. And then Jesus responds, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. It’s like a camel going through the eye of a needle for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.” Then they responded and said, “Well, then who can be saved?” They believed in that day a prosperity theology of if you are rich it means you are God’s people; you are blessed by God. So if the rich can’t get in, nobody can get in. Jesus responded and said, “Well, what’s impossible with men is possible with God.”

So in the flow of that context now Peter speaks up and he says, verse 28, “Behold, we have left our own homes and followed You.” Now, Peter wants to say, “We see what this fellow just did, the extremely wealthy man. He couldn’t leave everything behind and follow you but we have done that.” And Peter was right in a sense, he had indeed left all, at least all outward attachments to follow Jesus Christ. But I do think there is a problem here with Peter and it’s the same problem you and I wrestle with in some degree or in some dimension. Peter may have left all outward attachments but he hadn’t left all of his pride and there is real importance in that point. In verse 28, the New American Standard says, “Peter says, ‘We left our own homes.'” It’s the word “idios.” The word “home” is not in the original. It just means “all that is distinctly mine, everything I have control over, I have put that aside to follow you, Christ. I have put it aside. My marriage. My children. My brother.