The Lure Of The Easy Way

Rev Gideon Lee

Matthew 16:21-28 (NIV)

Jesus Predicts His Death

21 From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.

22 Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”

23 Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”

24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save their life[a] will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. 26 What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? 27 For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done.

28 “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”

I like the story of the young man, eager to make it to the top, who went to a well-known millionaire businessman and asked him the first reason for his success. The businessman answered without hesitation, "Hard work." After a lengthy pause the young man asked, "What is the SECOND reason?"

We want to deal this morning with the lure of the easy way. Jesus and His disciples were at Caesarea Philippi. Their ministry to this point had been a stunning success. Crowds pressed in on them everywhere they went. People eagerly reached out to touch this attractive young teacher from Nazareth. The disciples themselves were caught up in the excitement of it all. Jesus asked them, "Who do you say I am?" and Simon Peter answered enthusiastically, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!" It was one of the most dramatic moments in the disciples' pilgrimage with Jesus.

Then Jesus changed the subject. He began to tell them that the crowds would soon turn against Him; He would be crucified, on the third day he would be raised. The disciples didn't know what to make of all this. Simon Peter took Jesus aside: "Forbid it Lord that these things should happen to you." Jesus' response to Simon Peter is as harsh as any words in the New Testament: "Get behind me Satan! You are not on the side of God but of man."

Perhaps Jesus called Simon Peter Satan' because of Jesus' experience in the wilderness immediately after His baptism by John. In today's parlance, it was there that Satan revealed to Jesus the way to make a million dollars in three easy steps turn stones to bread, leap off the pinnacle of the temple, "Bow down and worship me!" I see Satan not as a red caped figure with a pitchfork but dressed in a $400 suit and offering in a glib and polished tongue instant success, instant glamour, instant gratification. We can see Satan almost anywhere today. Jesus encountered him this time in Simon Peter: "Forbid it Lord that you should have to suffer and die."

If there is any doubt that Jesus is resisting the lure of the easy way, listen to the words that follow: "If any man would be my disciple, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me."

Many of us today are making the mistake of following the easy way. We see it in our family life. Homes are disintegrating because a father or a mother decides one day that enough is enough and simply walks out. To be sure, being a parent is hard work. Bill Cosby says that some people have children as a means of a kind of immortality. He says he just hopes that all five of his are out of the house before he dies.

We see it in our work. True, it is nice to see that the work ethic has regained respectability. Many of us can remember when young people dreaded taking their place in the business world. That attitude was reflected in a Doonesbury cartoon a few year back that had Zonker Harris noticing a despondent student coming out of the library. Zonker asked, "What's the problem?" The student replied, "It's nothing anybody can do anything about. It's just that tomorrow I'm graduating and on Monday I'm assuming a position as a junior vice president of the Chase Manhattan Bank of New York." Zonker is immediately shocked and saddened and says, "Hey, man, I'm sorry. I didn't know." Those were the seventies. But all that has changed. Today many people would sell their soul to be a junior vice president of Chase Manhattan and according to recent news reports MANY OF THEM HAVE. So a national magazine asks on its cover, "Whatever happened to ethics?" We are working harder but we are still seeking the easy way.

We can also see the desire to follow the easy way in the church. One fellow said to another, "Say, I heard that you bought a new car. How did you ever afford it?" The other fellow replied, "I just cancelled my church pledge." The first one said, "Gee, I wish that I could buy a new car for that little."

We are the devotees of the easy way even though everyone in this room knows TWO IMPORTANT TRUTHS.

1) THE FIRST IS THAT THE PATH TO PERSONAL SUCCESS IS THAT OF SELF DENIAL. 

Zig Ziglar tells of visiting the Washington Monument. As he and his party approached the monument, he heard a guide announcing loudly that there would be a two hour wait to ride the elevator to the top of the monument. However, with a smile on his face the guide then said, "There is no waiting to go to the top if you are willing to take the stairs." Successful people know that there is no limit to what a healthy, reasonably intelligent person in this society can accomplish if he or she is willing to "climb the stairs." The opportunity is there for anyone willing to pay the price.

During the Los Angeles Open Golf Tournament a few years ago, Arnold Palmer, the legendary golfer, was interviewed while practicing on the putting green. "Arnie," he was asked, "What do you feel was wrong to make you play so poorly this past year?" Without looking up from his putting, Arnold answered in his own direct way, "I wasn't hard enough on myself, that's all." Two hours after this brief interview, the same reporter came back to find Palmer still practicing on the putting green. The reporter concluded, "The greatness of Arnold Palmer is his choice of the hard way."

Success in life requires a willingness to resist the lure of the easy way. A sound body requires that we exercise, eat the right foods, conquer bad habits. A sound mind requires that we read, that we observe, that we continually learn. A sound marriage requires that each partner goes into it with the understanding that marriage is not a 50/50 proposition but a 70/30 one in which both parties give the 70. A sound family means that we will take the time to be sensitive to the needs of our children, that we provide not only for their physical needs but their emotional and spiritual needs as well. Such goals require sacrifice, they require perseverance, they require determination. But everyone of us knows that the path to personal success is the path of self-denial.

2) WE ALSO KNOW THAT SELF DENIAL IS ESSENTIAL TO THE SALVATION OF THE WORLD. 

Here is the missing summons in our day. Our world faces some tremendous challenges. Is there on one who cares enough to act? Some cynic has said, "When the going gets tough, everyone leaves." That happened to Jesus. As the way got harder, the numbers of those who followed dwindled until finally He died alone on Calvary. Yet, if He had been unwilling to lay down His life, the world would never have known the love of the Father. If those early disciples had not picked up Jesus' cross and followed after Him, we still would not know about that love and if you and I do not pick up the cross in our time make those hard choices and assume those difficult responsibilities our children's children will not know the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

You may know the thrilling story of Glen Cunningham, a young man whose legs were so badly burned as a boy that doctors said he would never walk again. However, this determined champion went on to win an Olympic gold medal as a miler. Even more importantly, Glen Cunningham devoted his life to helping troubled young people. Once, his wife asked, "Glen, why do we have to give so much more than others? No one else is doing what we are." Glen answered, "That's the reason, Ruth. No one else is doing it."

Richard Leaky, the famous archeologist who worked in northern Kenya, discussed in his book People of the Lake what it is that separates man from the great apes. It is not man's intelligence, says Leakey, but his generosity. Only human beings have the ability to share. Only human beings are capable of genuine compassion. Only human beings are capable of laying down their lives for a friend. When it comes to taking up the cross of self denial, however, many of us have not discovered our humanity. If we don't care what happens to this world, who will? If we don't feed the hungry, who will? If we don't shelter the homeless, who will? If we don't tell the world about Christ, who will?

I recall the words of General William Booth, founder of The Salvation Army and a friend to the down and out. Three months, before his death he wrote: "While women weep as they do now, I'll fight; while little children go hungry as they do now, I'll fight; while men go to prison, in and out, in and out, as they do now, I'll fight; while there is a drunkard left, while there is a poor lost girl upon the streets, while there remains one dark soul without the light of God, I'll fight - fight to the very end."

Can you imagine General Booth writing a book entitled Looking Out For Number One? What has happened to us? "If any man or woman would be my disciple," Jesus says to us, "Let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." That is the word we desperately need to hear. It is a call, as M. Scott Peck would phrase it to "a road less travelled." In Zig Ziglar's analogy it is the lonely stairs as opposed to the crowded elevator. Or as Jesus himself once said, it is the narrow way that only a committed few will pursue.

How about you? The road to personal success is the road of self denial. Any worthwhile self-help book will tell you that. Self-denial, however, is also essential to the salvation of the world.

The story is told of a worker in an inner-city mission who had given many years to a most discouraging ministry. A friend came to him one day and said, "Why don't you leave this job before you are broken by its inhuman burden? Why don't you run away from it all?" The man replied, "There are times when I would very much like to leave it all. But there is a strange, loving man on a cross who won't let me."

Jesus said, "If anyone would be my disciple, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." That is His call to your life and mine today. Can He count on you? Will you join the company of the committed? Will you take up your cross today? 

Many thanks to Rev Gideon Lee for his sermon notes.