Brother Ben, why don't you go ahead and give us your Luke 14 here. I know that's
something you wanted to share. Yeah I wanted to share these verses and get
your guys's perspective on it, both Pastor Shelley and Pastor Mejia, because
some people I think have maybe struggled with these verses. They seem jarring on
the onset and I'll go ahead and read it so everybody can know exactly what I'm
referring to. Luke chapter 14 starting at verse 25 where the Bible said, "And there
went great multitudes with him and he turned and said unto them, 'If any man
come to me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and
brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.'" So
people will look at these verses here specifically verse 26 and ask the
question, well hold on a minute, is the Bible prescribing for me to actually
hate my family members? And perhaps it leads to a little bit of confusion. They
might not know how to actually apply this in their lives, and so I just wanted to
get the perspective from you, Pastor Mejia, and Pastor Shelley, you as well.
What do you think about this verse? How would you apply this practically for
someone who might be struggling to figure out exactly how they ought to be
applying it? Well I have two interpretations to this and I think
they're both valid. One would be the fact that when he says, "If any man come to me
and hate not his father and mother and wife," obviously you know the Bible
commands us to honor thy father and honor thy mother and that is the default
setting that we should always have. And in verse 26 when it says hate, what I
personally interpreted it as initially when I first came across this verse is
that my love for Christ and my love for the Bible should almost seem like a
hatred for everything else, which is actually something that I personally
experienced even from personal family members where they feel like I'm just
not with them anymore, I'm always in church or I'm always serving God and they
almost think like I hate them or I don't want to be around them anymore but
really what it is is just that I just love the Lord. I love the Lord, I want to
be in church, I love preaching and so I've always interpreted this verse you
know the first application I would make is that my love for Christ should almost
seem as though I'm disdaining everything else because of the fact that I'm
committed unto the Lord, I'm committed unto His word and His service but I
think a great secondary application to this verse would be could be applied to
people who have reprobate parents for example you know sometimes not all
sometimes but you know our parents mean a lot to us and it would be devastating
to find out that one of our parents is a reprobate or a God-hater and there might
be a temptation there to maintain that relationship with that parent because
they're our mom or our dad whereas the Bible tells us that we should have
nothing to do with the haters of God and so at that point that individual would
have the choice to either choose the Lord or you know choose their father or
mother and of course we're not referring to salvation or anything like that this
is referring to taking up your cross and following him being a disciple of Jesus
Christ you know being a servant of the Lord we can't serve God and and rub
shoulders with reprobates and haters of God and so that's why he says if any man
come to me and hate not his father or mother so I think that would be a great
secondary application but that's how I would interpret that verse. Yeah I agree
with those interpretations I for me when I read these verses you have to you
always have to balance everything in the scripture and I think Jesus actually
illustrates this verse for us in different parts in the Bible because like
Pastor Mejia said we have to honor our father and her mother you know there's
verses in the Bible that says no man yet ever hated his own flesh but nereth us
and cherishes it so you know when it's talking about hating here it doesn't
even say father it says his own life also so it's very clear you know the
Bible Jesus uses really strong language such as you know we're supposed to die
daily and we're supposed to crucify the flesh and so I believe that a lot of
these wordings are really to illustrate the fact that we're supposed to choose
Christ over anything and everything and it does not matter what obstacle would
come our way we see someone coming and asking Jesus Christ about going and
bearing his father before he can go and follow him and he says let the dead
bury the dead and and so kind of just almost showing a hatred in the sense
that you know not come to your own father's funeral is kind of extreme if
you think about it I mean to tell someone not to show up for their father's
funeral is really it almost seems like you would you would hate your father not
to go to his funeral but Jesus is basically saying like you have this one
opportunity to come and follow me and and you should be willing to choose me
even above going to your father's funeral not really giving any kind of
second thought to these type of relationships if you think about Jesus
Christ preaching they came to him and said his brethren and his mother were
standing without to speak with him and he didn't give them the time of day at
all he's just like you know behold are my mother and father and brethren and
sisters and he's like you know they that do the will of God these be my mother
and father and brethren they which hear the word of God and do it so to me it's
almost as elevating this the spiritual journey your your ministry above all
carnal things whether that be a physical relationship even your own life kind of
dying to those relationships but I would not interpret this as like you know
hatred could kind of almost seem like you're attacking someone obviously I
don't believe you should be attacking your family members or aggressively
going after them or or trying to do evil under your family members I believe you
should only do good under your family members but essentially that you would
be willing to discard that relationship if it really came between serving God or
not but again I try to tell my church members and everybody that I never try
to leave relationships I let them walk away you know I try to engage with my
family and friends and try to have relationship with them as much as I can
but at the end of the day I'm just gonna serve Christ and if they don't want to
serve Christ with me then you know that relationship may diminish and it could
appear that I hate them but like Pastor Mahia said it's more that I just love Christ.
And there are ultimatums at times you know as a Christian you might hit a
crossroads where somebody you're related to makes you pick between them and going
to church or them and the Bible them and the doctrines you believe and I think
that's where perhaps Luke chapter 14 verse 26 would come into play as well
and you know pastor me here you brought up that it hurts a lot more when it's
people you're related to and I can a hundred percent not only agree with that
but relate to that because I've been in a situation where I had family members
who wanted nothing to do with me and you know attacked me for what I believe in
things like that and I remember you know even one time when pastor Shelley was
driving back from the Houston area and I called him and I was like hey you know I
just need some advice on this because of I'm not gonna go into great detail on
what happened but it was something to do with familial persecution and he helped
me out helped me get through it things like that but it makes you stronger it
grows your faith that makes you a stronger Christian and so I feel like
even though it's really really hard you come out on the other side battle tested
in a sense