Does that mean you work your way into God’s good graces or that you someone earn or merit salvation? Not at all. It is God who saves.

Your salvation comes through faith. It does not come as a result of your works. No one will ever be able to boast about their contribution to the work of their salvation. But that verse goes on to point out that your salvation is not an end unto itself. You were not saved BY good works, but you were saved FOR good works.

You are God’s workmanship. He has does the work of creating in you a new life. The result of being saved is that you will walk in those good works for which you were created.

It has become customary in certain Christian circles to speak of discipleship as something that, while good and desirable, is not necessary to Christianity. This teaching is one that says sanctification is optional to the Christian life and that there are some who live their entire lives as "carnal Christians" and who never exhibit any of the fruit of the Spirit or any growth in Christ, yet nevertheless are saved.

The teaching of the Scriptures is completely antithetical to this view. The Scriptures use the term "disciple" as an exact equivalent of the term "Christian." This is seen in Act 11:26 where the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.

What is a disciple? The term is translated from the Greek word mathetes, a "learner" and comes from the word manthano, "to learn." But the idea here is not merely rote learning of fact. As we shall see in this passage, the discipleship to which Jesus calls men and women involves a life commitment.

Discipleship involves more than a mere academic knowledge of certain facts. It involves a commitment to following Jesus.

This is a hard passage. If you read this and it does not bother you, you haven’t read it. For Jesus to say these words would be blasphemy if He were not God. He demands to be the center of attention and the object of complete loyalty.

Does Jesus really and truly call us to hate our family? No. To the contrary, the Scriptures are quite explicit when they tell husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the church (Ephesians 5:25); mothers to love their children (Titus 2:4); and for children to honor father and mother (Ephesians 6:2). Indeed, we are even taught to love our enemies and those who persecute us (Matthew 5:44).

So then what does Jesus mean when he says that those who wish to be He disciple must hate father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters?

This is a figure of speech. Jesus is calling for a commitment that is so great that anything by comparison will be deemed as hatred. This is in contrast to the parable in the previous verses where one of the invited guests declined the invitation because he had recently married a wife (14:20).

Do you want to be a disciple of Jesus? You must give Him preeminence. You must recognize His sovereignty and His Lordship. You must give Him your devotion and your love.

There is an old saying that goes: "Anything that is free is worth what was paid for it." This even applies to our salvation. While it is freely given to us, it was the most expensive gift ever given. It cost God the death of His Son. In a similar vein, there is a cost to discipleship.

Evangelists often come across as a used car salesman: "Don’t read the fine print; we’ll get to that later." But Jesus tells unbelievers to count the cost before coming to Him.

Jesus calls you to recognize Him as the Lord of your life. He wants it all. He refuses to be sectored off to a small portion of your life. He refuses to be a weekend God. And so, He calls for you to count the cost. If you are going to be a Christian, be a real one.

There is a familiar story told of Alexander the Great. After each battle, there would be a tribunal where he would sit in judgment to reward those who had done well and to punish those who had done poorly. One day a young man was brought before him who had shown fear in the face of the enemy.

For the first time that anyone could remember, Alexander’s face softened and he appeared to show compassion for the youth. Perhaps he thought of his own infant son as he looked upon the young man. In a gentle voice, he asked him, "What is your name?"

"Alexander," came the reply.

"What did you say?"

"Alexander."

With a roar, the king jumped from his throne, took the shaken youth by his cloak and hurled him to the floor. "Either change your actions or change your name!"

When we come as disciples, we come to take the name of the King. We are called to count the cost of bearing that name.

There is an old hymn that says, "Jesus paid it all." There is a great truth to that. The debt of your sin was paid by Christ on the cross. The payment for that redemption price cost Him His very life. He gave up all for you. And He calls you to do the same thing. He calls you to give up everything you have and everything you are and to commit your very being to Him.

At this point, you might be thinking to yourself, "I want to follow Jesus but I’ve asked myself if I have the resources to see this through to the end and I don’t know that I have what it takes." There is hope for you. The point is not that you are rich in spiritual resources. The point is that you give up what you have and He provides what you need. You give up that which is producing death in your life and He gives that which is life eternal. You give up that which wars against your soul and in its place He gives that which saves your soul.

In their zeal to deny that good works are a requirement for salvation, some have gone to the extreme of also denying that good works are even a valid evidence for salvation. Some even maintain that a person can turn away from God, reject Christ and become an atheist and still be saved as long as they once believed.

1 John 2:19 speaks to this issue of those who turn away from the faith by indicating that "they went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, in order that it might be shown that they all are not of us." One of the signs of a true believer is that he continues to believe and he continues in fellowship with God and His people.

Jesus said that the test of truth is in its fruit. The test of a true believer is found in how he lives.

If you look at your life and see rotten fruit, then the natural conclusion is that it must stem from the corrupt tree. You cannot continue to see the fruit of an unsaved life and thereby assume that you are saved. The proof is in the fruit. By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples (John 15:8).

Martin Luther once said that "faith alone justifies, but not the faith that is alone. Works are not taken into consideration when the question respects justification. But true faith will no more fail to produce them than the sun can cease to give light."

The difference between the Roman Catholic view of Faith and Works in Justification can be pictured like this:

This is not to say that a Christian never struggles with sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us (1 John 1:8). But the same author who wrote that verse also said that those who have been born of God do not continually sin, because God's seed abides in them; they cannot continually sin, because they have been born of God (1 John 3:9).

Here is the point. God does not justify whom He does not also sanctify. When God does one work, it is a guarantee that He shall also do the other.