Friday Focus...A great quote of John Stott from Basic Christianity

This Sunday I am reading a long quote in my sermon from John Stott found in his book "Basic Christianity."

His full name is John Robert Walmsley Stott.  He was born on April 27, 1921 and died on July 27, 2011.  He was a single man who served the Church of England as an anglican pastor.  He pastored the church he also grew up in, the All Souls Church.

John Stott wrote over 50 books and one of them was "Basic Christianity" in 1958 which was put into my hands while at college in 1983.  It was required reading for one of my Bible classes along with "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis.  Now I am returning to it in 2019, some 61 years later and seeing its relevance.  

The quote from Mr. Stott lines up with the passage I am handling this Sunday from Luke chapter 14.  So here is the quote in italic and I will put some thoughts embedded in the parentheses.

"Jesus never concealed the fact that his religion included a demand as well as an offer.  Indeed, the demand was as total as the offer was free.  If he offered men his salvation, he also demanded their submission.  He gave no encouragement whatever to thoughtless applicants for discipleship.  He brought no pressure to bear on any inquirer.  He sent irresponsible enthusiasts away empty.  Luke tells of three men who either volunteered, or were invited, to follow Jesus; but no one passed the Lord's test."

(I suppose these are the three excuses given by three individuals to not come to the banquet that we find out is Jesus' banquet.  Jesus indicates that these three who were invited will not enjoy his banquet.  Luke 14:15-24)

"The rich young ruler, too, moral, earnest and attractive, who wanted eternal life on his own terms, went away sorrowful, with his riches intact but with neither life nor Christ as his possession."

(This is a reference to Luke 18:18-23.)

"The Christian landscape is strewn with the wreckage of derelict, half built towers--the ruins of those who began to build and were unable to finish.  For thousands of people still ignore Christ's warning and undertake to follow him without first pausing to reflect on the cost of doing so."

(This is the heart of the passage that I am preaching on this Sunday, Luke 14:25-35.  Jesus gives the word pictures of the man building a tower and a king going to war.  Each is instructed to first sit down and count the cost.  One does and the other doesn't.  One is referred to as a fool and the other is wise to divert an impending slaughter.)

"The result is the great scandal of Christendom today, so called 'nominal Christianity.'  In countries to which Christian civilization has spread, large numbers of people have covered themselves with a decent, but thin, veneer of Christianity.  They have allowed themselves to become somewhat involved, enough to be respectable but not enough to be uncomfortable."

(The phrase I used last Sunday and will again this Sunday is, "religiously related but not righteously redeemed."  How many in our churches are religious but not redeemed?)

"Their religion is a great, soft cushion.  It protects them from the hard unpleasantness of life, while changing its place and shape to suit their convenience.  No wonder the cynics speak of hypocrites in the church and dismiss religion as escapism."

(The line, "a great, soft cushion" is my favorite.  We have created a Christianity that is not what Jesus describes in the Scriptures.  We are not called to self-fulfillment but to self-denial.  In our passage, Jesus says we are to "renounce" all our possessions.  We are to renounce our people (relationships); our plan (reality); our property (resources); and our pride (rights).)

"The message of Jesus was very different.  He never lowered his standards or modified his conditions to make his call more readily acceptable.  He asked his first disciples, and he has asked every disciple since, to give him their thoughtful and total commitment.  Nothing less than this will do."

(What a conclusion from Pastor Stott.  A discussion of this passage with a group of local pastors ended up with the same conclusion.  It also led to a conversation about how we present the gospel in our churches so the invitation of salvation is clear and the cost of sanctification is covered.  Many of us grew up in environment that was heavy on one and light on the other.)

I hope you have an opportunity or take the time to read this quote again and let it sink into your soul.  We are blasted with a message, even from many of our churches, that fluffs up the cushion that they want us to sit upon.  In comparison, it seems that Jesus is laying out a bed of nails for us to walk across.  Our comfort is that whatever Jesus asks of us is what He has already done.  The final reward is not obtained here amongst the world's pleasures but with Him in the heavenly realms.

Adam