If you are not a disciple of Jesus Christ, will you go to heaven? We’ve been talking about discipleship and some of the more important points to consider about what Jesus said about discipleship.
What We’ve Examined About Discipleship So Far
We’ve looked at the Great Commission (see Matthew 28:19-20), where Jesus said, “Go make disciples,” and He helps to define disciples by saying, “teach them to obey all that I commanded you, after you baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit”.
We looked at John 8 where He told a bunch of believers, “if you are truly My disciples you’ll abide in My word and you’ll progressively be set free from sin.”
Then we looked at Luke 14 where Jesus laid down three requirements to be His disciple. One of which is we have to hate our loved ones. We talked about that. Another one is that we have to be willing to embrace hardship and suffering for His sake, take up our cross. And thirdly, have to give up all our possessions.
And you see that with the people in the Book of Acts, again, there’s no dichotomy of believers and disciples. No, it just talks about the disciples and all those who believed were disciples. And it affected what they did with their money. They began caring for widows. And people who had a lot started liquidating their assets to meet pressing needs of those within the body of Christ.
And so, these are things to be thinking about as we consider, am I a disciple?
If You’re Not a Disciple of Jesus Christ, Will You Go To Heaven?
Now the question that I posed at the beginning of this episode is, “If you’re not a disciple of Christ, will you go to Heaven”? Because some people think, “Well, I’m not a disciple of Christ, I’m a believer in Jesus.”
I think we’ve pretty well proven that disciples and believers are one in the same. If you’re not a disciple, you’re not really a believer. So to answer the question that I posed at the beginning of this episode, the answer is “no”.
If you’re not a disciple of Christ, you’re not on the road to heaven. You’re a goat who thinks that he or she is a sheep.
A Lesson From Salt
So, let’s look at the last thing that Jesus said in Luke 14. After He lists these three requirements to be His disciple, He finishes out what He says with these two very significant verses that maybe are a little bit difficult for us to grasp, but I think we can grasp them.
Therefore, salt is good; but if even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned? It is useless either for the soil or for the manure pile; it is thrown out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. – Luke 14:34-35
“Therefore, salt is good.” Well, okay I agree with that. Do you agree with that? Salt is good. Now, we’re used to salt pretty much as a seasoning; sprinkle that salt on the steak!
But in Jesus’ day, salt wasn’t so much of a seasoning as it was a preservative. You rub salt on the meat and that keeps it from rotting, because you don’t have refrigeration. So this is the best they could do at that time.
So salt is good. You better believe it’s good! It’s preserving a lot of things, although making those things taste pretty salty.
The Impossibility of Salt Not Being Salty
Then Jesus says, “but if even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned?”
Now you could say “Well, wait a second David, he’s talking about seasoning here.” Well yes, because you can tell salt is salt by its taste. It has a seasoned flavor, right? Sure.
So if you put your finger in a little pile of salt there and stick a little on your tongue, if it doesn’t taste salty, there’s a pretty good chance it’s not salt. Right? That’s the conclusion you’d come to.
And I’ve never heard of salt being “unsalty”. And maybe there’s an explanation for something like that in Jesus’ day. Maybe that was some kind of a seasoning that had salt in it and they just called it salt, and on occasion salt wasn’t mixed with the other stuff and so the seasoning became or was “unsalty”. I don’t know. It doesn’t really make a lot of difference for the sake of our understanding of what He’s saying here.
But, because salt itself cannot become tasteless, if it doesn’t have the salty taste, it’s not salt. And maybe that is the point. The impossibility of salt not being salty.
If You’re a Believer in Christ, There Will Be Evidence
Because if you’re a believer, if you’re a disciple of Jesus Christ, there’s going to be absolute evidence for it. You’re going to fit what Jesus listed as what characterizes a disciple.
This is a person that loves Jesus supremely, even more than their loved ones. This is a person who’s willing to embrace suffering and does sacrifice for His sake. This is a person whose check book reflects that they are a disciple of Christ. If you don’t have that, the salt isn’t salty. It really isn’t salt, it’s pseudo-salt.
If We’re Not Disciples, We’re Good for Nothing
“If even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned? It is useless either for the soil or for the manure pile.”
And I don’t understand why you’d be putting salt in either soil or a manure pile, but there must have been some reason in Jesus’ day. But, again, we don’t have to understand that. (And if you do understand that, please write to me and tell me. I’d love to learn that myself.)
It’s useless for these purposes, it’s not good for anything. It’s even these purposes it’s useless for. It’s thrown out. It’s good for nothing, it has no value whatsoever. It’s worthless.
Can you understand what Jesus is saying here? That if we are not His disciples, we’re good for nothing. “Throw it out.” It serves no use to God.
Something Even the Devil Believes
So you can see the huge danger there is when folks buy into the lie that you can be a believer in Jesus and not be His disciple. Oh my goodness, this is so sobering.
And you have those people whom Jesus warned about in the future judgment of the sheep and the goats (see Matthew 25:31-46) who say, “Lord, Lord when did we see You hungry or thirsty and not feed You or give You drink? When did we see You naked and not clothe You? When did we see You sick and in prison, and didn’t visit You? Because if we had seen you Lord, we’d have done it. We care about You.”
“Depart from Me, I never knew you. You didn’t do it to the least of these, it shows you didn’t care about me. You’re good for nothing.”
Jesus wants disciples. And I would say that’s the major problem in the body of Christ today. We’ve got a lot of people who have head knowledge, and they think it’s saving faith. Or they acknowledge some truth, some theological truth, like Jesus died for everyone’s sins. But the Devil believes that! That’s not it. It’s Jesus. I believe Jesus is Lord. And so I’ve repented and every day I take up my cross and I try to follow Him.
Okay, thanks so much for joining me on this little lesson. God bless you.
