How many decisions are made on impulse?  How often are you in a store or on line and you see something and for some reason you just have to have it?  How many things do you have in your house or apartment that you, at the time, just couldn’t live without?  I was always reminded of how much I collect over time when I moved to a new house.  You don’t realize how much you have accumulated until you have to move it.  If I was move forward thinking and more honest with myself about my needs I could do with a lot less but chances are that’s not going to happen any time soon.  The fact is that many of us are moved by impulse.

The whole field of marketing is geared to get us to impulse buy.  Bread and milk, two very popular items in the supermarket, are always in the rear of the store.  The plan is that you need those items and if the owner can get you to walk through the entire store to pick them up there is a good chance that you will see something else you need to buy.  The candy is at the checkout counter.  Standing there waiting to get you items scanned you will not be able to resist picking up a candy bar.  Product placement is key to sales.

I was in IKEA the other day and they have this impulse buying thing down.  They lay out the store in such a way that you have to walk through the entire store to get what you want.  Then at the end, just before you check out, they have all the little appliances and gadget all on sale for a few bucks.  Then to make matters worse they put the dollar items at the checkout counter.

Then there is the whole coupon thing. They entice you to by something because it is on sale.  I always feel like a trained monkey.  They have you go through this newspaper to save a few dollars but what they want is for you to see all the items that are on sale hoping that you will not be able to resist a purchase.

We are moved to make impulse decisions.  We are reactionary as opposed to being people of action.  We are conditioned to respond to the things around us.  Yet the thing that makes us different from the rest of creation is our ability to step back from our experiences and evaluate our surroundings.  We have the ability to write our history and look back over it so to better prepare for our future.  Human beings have the ability to count the cost of the decisions they are about to make.  The problem is that too often we don’t.  We have the ability to be proactive but all to often we just react.

You see this in modern evangelism techniques.  The idea is to make an emotional appeal and then when the person is moved to press for a decision.  This is so much apart of our culture and our perception of Christian evangelism that when the idea of sharing our faith with the unsaved is presented too often this sales pitch idea is the first thing that comes to mind and people react by saying no.  They feel they are not qualified to clinch the deal.  As we look at how Jesus speaks of the kingdom and invites people to faith he takes a completely different approach.  Jesus gives people every opportunity not to follow him.

We are told in our text that a great crowd was following Jesus; nothing new in the early part of his ministry.  Jesus takes the opportunity to teach them.  As always he goes right to where we live. “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sister, yea and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”  Not the approach I would recommend when trying to win disciples.

Let me say from the outset that Jesus is not asking us to hate everyone who is near and dear to us.  So what is he asking?  This is a statement about priorities.  Who do you really love?  Who will you really die for?  Jesus is telling us that our love for him must be so great that in comparison our feelings for the people closest to us seem like hate.  Follow my reasoning.  If you want to be a disciple of Jesus nothing can come between you and him.  We put the people that we care about high on our priority list.  If it is a choice between helping an acquaintance or helping a family member family has first priority.  Jesus says our loyalty to him must trump everything else.  If you put your father or mother before Jesus you cannot be his disciple.  If you put you wife, husband or child before Jesus again you cannot be a disciple.  Even your siblings must take a back seat or you are unworthy as a disciple.  He goes so far as to see that even your own desires must take a back seat to Jesus.  Jesus must be first in your life and he must be way out in front.

The issue of self sacrifice becomes an important one for us.  Jesus hones in on it.  “Whoever does not take up his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple,” Jesus tells us.  This is not the modern evangelistic method.  Modern preachers fail to talk about sin because people will be offended and turned off.  They fail to lay out the cost of discipleship lest the people turn away.  Jesus jumps right in and says count the cost.

What is this idea of taking up one’s cross?  Some think it has to do with our struggles in life.  The extreme would be some form of persecution but some think the daily inconveniences that we go through each day represent the cross we bear.  Jesus is talking of something much more profound.  He asks us to die to self.  The cross is the instrument not of our suffering but rather of our death.  Bonhoeffer said that who Jesus calls to follow him he bids them come and die.  Not suffering but death.

Well Jesus is not calling us to suicide or to put ourselves in harms way.  What is he asking?  Jesus calls us to put him first in all things.  In our jobs, in our relationships, in our personal goals and desires we are to submit to the will of God.  As Christians we are called to follow Jesus in every aspect of our lives.

Counting the cost is something successful people do all the time.  Jesus gives two examples.  He said a good builder will not just jump into a project but will first count the cost.  How much will it take to build this building?  How long will it take?  How many men will be needed to complete the task?  What problems might be encountered along the way and does he have the ability to overcome them?  If you don’t have all that is necessary it would be unwise to start the project.  He talks of the king who goes to war.  He must consider the size of his own army, his firer power, and his resources.  Then he must access the strength of his opponent.  If he can’t win the war he needs to think of a different way to overcome his enemy than by brute force.

Jesus says to us this morning count the cost of discipleship.  Your family and friends might dessert you.  You might not achieve the goals you set for yourself.  You could suffer persecution.  We hear a lot of talk about the American Dream these days.  There is a fear that this generation might not do as well as the last one.  The immediate future doesn’t look real bright as the unemployment rate soars.  The new car and the big house might be out of reach.  The job you want you might not get.  Will you follow Jesus?

We believe that salvation is of God.  Unless the Holy Spirit enters a person and awakens faith in them they will not see the kingdom of God .  Jesus doesn’t resort to emotional appeals because he doesn’t have too.  To tell people to come to Jesus and all will be well might not in their case be truthful.  Being a Christian doesn’t guarantee an easy life.  So what is the draw?

The reality for the Christian is that faith in the atoning death of Jesus on the cross gets us forgiveness of our sins.  When our sins are forgiven we are put right with God and that relationship is restored.  When we are in a right standing with God that relationship will be never ending; stretching into eternity.  From the perspective of eternity the struggles of this life Paul tells us are, “momentary light afflictions.”

Jesus makes no promises in this life except to tell us that our struggles are common to all men and along with that he assures us that he will never leave of forsake us.  Following Jesus will be costly but whatever we give up is replaced with Jesus.  At the end of this life we are promised eternal life with him.  All this because of what Jesus did for us on Calvary .

Jesus says count the cost.  You can gain the whole world but in the end you lose or you can die to self and gain Christ Jesus.  What is you decision?  Let me close with this warning.  The church in Laodicea as recorded in Revelation 3 tried to play the middle ground.  They neither rejected the gospel nor did they sell out for Jesus.  We are told they were neither hot nor cold.  Jesus said he would spit them out of his mouth.  No room for luke warm Christians.  You need to way the cost and either be in or out.