The Cost of Non-Discipleship

Last year we remodeled our master bathroom in our house. It costs us a lot more money than it should have. See a few years earlier we started noticing a problem. Our shower door wouldn't close all the way. It wasn't a big deal so we just kind of left it, we thought it was just out of square. It would have cost more money than we had at the time and so we just kind of endured the mild annoyance that accompanied cleaning the water off the floor when we stepped out of the shower.

Like any home renovation project, the longer you wait to fix something, the more expensive it gets and so eventually we noticed the tile cracking and breaking loose presumably from the water. By the time the small repair was done we were sinking thousands of dollars into new showers and tile and subfloors. It would have cost a lot less to fix a shower door than remodel a bathroom.

We talk a lot about discipleship on the blog. It has been the passion of my life for a few years now. Nothing is more important and more rewarding than watching God use you to grow others in their faith in God. But make no mistake, Discipleship costs. It costs time, it costs energy, it costs sleep, it costs popularity and approval, it even costs short term growth. Raising the standard and the banner of discipleship is not easy nor should it be. Jesus clearly invited people to follow Him but He also didn't give them a false pretense of what it meant. He encouraged them to count the cost, He always tempered the call to follow Him with taking up crosses and denying themselves. There is a definite and difficult cost of discipleship.

But have you ever thought of the high cost of non-discipleship? I know that's probably not a word, but it is a definite reality. In Judges 2 & 3 we learn the high cost of un-discipleship. Just like our renovation project, in the long run, it will cost more not to disciple your kids than it would to disciple them.

Highlight:

'That whole generation was also gathered to their ancestors. After them another generation rose up who did not know the Lord or the works he had done for Israel. The Israelites did what was evil in the Lord ’s sight. They worshiped the Baals and abandoned the Lord , the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed other gods from the surrounding peoples and bowed down to them. They angered the Lord , ' Judges 2:10-12

Explain:

In Judges 2 & 3 we see a sad story unfold. We learn in chapter 3 of Judges that God had left nations in the land for this generation to learn to fight. The first two verses of Judges 3 read, "'These are the nations the Lord left in order to test all those in Israel who had experienced none of the wars in Canaan. This was to teach the future generations of the Israelites how to fight in battle, especially those who had not fought before. ‘ So these battles were providentially ordained so that these children who had never experienced war like their parents had under Joshua could find God to be faithful to them as well.

Sadly, Joshua’s generation was tremendous fighters but lousy teachers. There were only two things that Moses had charged them with as they entered the land, love the Lord and obey Him and teach it to your children. Let them know repeatedly of God’s faithfulness to you. They got it half right. They did love, obey, and serve the Lord under Joshua and even under the other elders that ruled with him. We learn this from Judges 2:7 which reads, 'The people worshiped the Lord throughout Joshua’s lifetime and during the lifetimes of the elders who outlived Joshua. They had seen all the Lord ’s great works he had done for Israel. ‘ The sad truth is that that’s where they stopped. They didn’t teach it to their children because as we learn from Judges 2:10 & 11 there arose a generation who didn’t know the Lord or the works he had done for Israel!

In one generation, the pendulum swung from victory to defeat just like God had promised it would if they didn’t teach it to their children. These kids had not been discipled in who God was or what He had done for them, and as a result the battles that were supposed to teach them of God’s faithfulness to them actually defeated them. These parents were supposed to prepare these kids for these battles not by knowing how to fight them but by reminding them of the God who would fight for them. It’s not about knowing the battles their kids would fight but about knowing the God who would fight for them. They were left with one job, instill in these kids a trust and a faith in the God who had fought for them. They were to do this by reminding them, keeping ever before them how God had been good to them in their lives.

Sadly though, the other part of what Moses said came true. They got prosperous and wealthy and comfortable and forgot that it was the Lord that had provided for them and consequently they didn’t tell their children and they children essentially forfeited all the blessing God had given them.

Apply:

This is the danger of non-discipleship. When we don’t disciple our kids by intentionally pouring into them the goodness of God and His faithfulness in our lives. When we don’t teach them about God’s character and who He is, the very battles that God has for them to fight that would reinforce the truths of God’s faithfulness we have instilled in them will be the very battles they will fall prey to and forfeit their freedom and live in slavery to the very things that distracted us from telling them about the God they should have loved and revered and served.

I fear that our comforts have made us forgetful and we can’t teach what we can’t remember. When we can’t remember God’s faithfulness in our lives, when we forget His goodness, we don’t teach it to our kids and there arises a generation that doesn’t know our God or His faithfulness. But the sad truth is, most of us would rather blame them for not knowing than take responsibility for us not teaching them. Who is really to blame? Them not knowing God or us not teaching Him to them? As a result the battles that God has left for them to fight they aren’t ready to fight. Teaching Your kids to learn to fight their battles is not about understanding what they will encounter but teaching them to be reliant on the God that you’ve encountered. When we do that, we prepare them for the battles because they have a God that outlives us, that is alive and working in their midst and they have learned to trust Him and obey Him and follow Him which was the key to our victory and will be the key to theirs as well.

When we disciple our kids in the God that’s been faithful to us, we prepare them to fight the battles that God has for them to fight to teach them that He will be faithful to them. When we get comfortable we forget and we can’t teach what we don’t remember. This is the danger of undiscipleship.

Respond:

God help me to always remember my dependence on You and to constantly remind myself of Your faithfulness. Help me to pour it into Carly and Colby. Help me to intentionally disciple them by testifying of Your faithfulness to me and Your character through Your word. For in so doing, I am preparing them for the battles You have for them to fight. Burn in me the danger of not discipling them, sear in my mind the danger of them being overtaken in the battles they fight because I failed to teach them and may that fuel my discipleship of them in the coming days. I pray You will give them a heart for You, one that loves You deeply and trust and obeys You explicitly.