What Does It Mean to Love Christ? (Luke 14:26)

What does it mean to love Christ? In Luke 14:26 Jesus 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.” We know Jesus didn’t literally mean to hate our parents, spouse, children, and siblings, because that would contradict other verses: First Timothy 5:8 says, “If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” If we’re told to care for our family members, how could Jesus tell us to hate them and mean that literally? In Matthew 5:44 Jesus said, “Love your enemies.” If Jesus tells us to love our enemies, He isn’t going to tell us to hate our family members and actually mean it. So how do we explain this? In Scripture, the word hate doesn’t always mean hate. Sometimes it is used to create a contrast, or to elevate one thing above another. In this case the word hate means, “Love less.” Jesus expects us to love him more than our family members. https://youtu.be/uVnw4qgvZw4 What does it mean to love Christ? Luke 14:26 says, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate….” We must love Jesus more than family. Table of ContentsFamily Worship Guide for What Does It Mean to Love Christ?Sermon Notes for What Does It Mean to Love Christ?Lesson One: We must love Jesus more than anyone else.Lesson Two: Love is actions versus feelings.Lesson Three: Our obedience demonstrates our love for Christ.Lesson Four: We love Jesus, because He first loved us with actions. Family Worship Guide for What Does It Mean to Love Christ? Directions: Read the verses and then answer the questions: Day 1: Luke 14:26 cf. Matthew 10:37, Deuteronomy 21:15-17, Genesis 29:30-31, Luke 16:13, Romans 9:13, Malachi 1:2-3, Matthew 22:35-38—What does it mean to love Jesus more than anyone else? Provide some practical examples of what this can look like in your life. Describe how the word hate can be used in the Bible. Who are some people in the Bible who seemed to hate others? What about love others? Day 2: 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, James 2:14-17—How does the world describe love? How is the world’s understanding of love different than the way the Bible presents love? How does understanding biblical love change your behavior toward others? Day 3: John 14:15, 15:10, 1 John 4:10, 19, John 3:16, Romans 5:8—How does our obedience demonstrate our love for Christ? Who are some people in Scripture who demonstrated their love for the Lord through their actions and obedience? How has God demonstrated his love for us? Sermon Notes for What Does It Mean to Love Christ? The title of this morning’s sermon is, “What Does It Mean to Love Christ?” On Sunday mornings we’re working our way through Luke’s gospel verse by verse and we find ourselves at chapter 14, verse 26. Please stand with me for the reading of God’s Word. Let’s back up to verse 25 for context… Luke 14:25 Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, 26 “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. 27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. You may be seated. Let’s pray. I think this passage contains the clearest teaching on discipleship in all of Scripture. In our last sermon in Luke’s gospel, we talked about how Jesus seemed to DISCOURAGE people from following Him. We looked at a few accounts of Him saying things that caused massive numbers of people to turn back. And this account is similar. Notice it says great crowds. I can’t say how many people this was, but I’m guessing if Jesus could miraculously feed tens of thousands of people, which happened on at least two occasions, we are talking about at least thousands of people following him here. Picture what this looked like, and let me ask you… What would you expect many popular religious leaders to think at this moment? Wow, this is great. Look at all the people following me. I better make sure I don’t mess this up and say something they don’t want to hear. What wonderful, encouraging thing can I say that will cause them to want to continue following me, and hopefully tell their friends so they start following me as well. But Jesus’s desire was never to build the largest possible crowd. Instead, he wanted to make true disciples; therefore, he never adapted His message to please people. He wasn’t running a popularity contest. He always spoke very plainly about the high cost of discipleship, and the cost never sounded higher than it does in these verses. He makes several bold demands that would make any halfhearted individuals turn away. Look at verse 26… Luke 14:26 “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. And this brings us to Lesson One… Lesson One: We must love Jesus more than anyone else. This instruction was especially appropriate in Jesus’s day, because choosing to follow Him could mean rejection by family, persecution, or even death. People who feared these things would quickly turn away after hearing this statement. What can this look like in our lives? You get saved, tell your family, and if they aren’t Christians, how do they respond? They might respond as though you hate them because you love Jesus more than them. They act like you’ve turned your back on them. If we are going to follow Jesus, we can’t even let our family turn us away from Him. Let’s talk about what exactly Jesus meant when he said this… We know he didn’t literally mean to hate our parents, spouse, children, and siblings, because that would contradict other verses... 1 Timothy 5:8 If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. If we’re told to care for our family members, how could Jesus tell us to hate them and mean that literally? Matthew 5:44 Love your enemies. If Jesus tells us to love our enemies, He isn’t going to tell us to hate our family members and actually mean it. So how do we explain this? He’s not referring to a literal, emotional hatred. If you write in your Bible, you can circle the word hate and write, “Love less.” Listen to the way it’s worded in the parallel account in Matthew’s gospel… Matthew 10:37 Whoever loves father or mother MORE THAN ME is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter MORE THAN ME is not worthy of me. And this reveals the idea behind hating our family members: we love Jesus more than them. In Scripture, the word hate doesn’t always mean hate. Sometimes it is used to create a contrast, or to elevate one thing above another. It’s not even that whatever is loved less is devalued or demoted. Instead, whatever is loved more is esteemed or given greater value. I have told you before that we want to let Scripture interpret Scripture, and this is what we see elsewhere in Scripture… Deuteronomy 21:15a “If a man has two wives, the one loved and the other HATED, This doesn’t literally mean that the man loves one wife and hates the other. If a man had two wives, he would not be able to love them equally. Inevitably he would love one more than the other and the one he loves less is said to be hated… Deuteronomy 21:15b and both the loved and THE UNLOVED (we would expect it to say the one loved and the one hated, but it says unloved because it is synonymous with hated) have borne him children, and if the firstborn son belongs to the HATED (referring to the one who’s unloved), 16 then on the day when he assigns his possessions as an inheritance to his sons, he may not treat the son of the loved as the firstborn in preference to the son of the HATED (or unloved), who is the firstborn, 17 but he shall acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the HATED (or unloved), by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the firstfruits of his strength. The right of the firstborn is his. These verses command a man to treat his wives equally, even though he doesn’t feel equally toward them. Here’s an actual example in the Old Testament… Genesis 29:30 Jacob…LOVED RACHEL MORE THAN LEAH, and served Laban for another seven years. 31 When the Lord saw that LEAH WAS HATED, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren. Jacob didn’t really hate Leah. He just loved her less. Briefly turn to the right to Luke 16:13… Luke 16:13 No servant can serve two masters, for either he will HATE THE ONE AND LOVE THE OTHER, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” This doesn’t mean we will love one master and hate the other. Instead, it means we can’t love two masters equally. We will end up loving one more, and the one that’s loved less is said to be hated. To put all this together… Just as Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah, and God loved Jacob more than Esau, we must love Christ more than we love our family members. What about Jesus saying we must hate our own life? The idea wouldn’t be that we would hate ourselves or be suicidal. Instead, we would put Jesus ahead of ourselves. Not only must we put family members second to Christ, we must put ourselves second to Christ. What does this look like? It looks like asking, not what we want for ourselves, but what Christ wants for us. It means instead of pursuing our will for our lives, we pursue Christ’s will for our lives. Now let me ask you a question that you might have been asking… Why does Jesus use this language? Why does he tell us to hate those closest to us, versus simply telling us to love Him? Here’s what I think is happening…