Submission to authority is not something that is understood in our culture. We all want to have authority, but few want to have to submit to it. The idea that we should do something just because someone says to is difficult for us. We just don’t like to be told what to do. After all, we live in America, the land of the free. We have a tradition of rebellion to uphold.
Some have taken this to the extreme. Do you remember Abbie Hoffman? He was arrested 53 times, lived underground for six years and never ran out of causes. When he died in 1989, at 52, he was remembered by many as the last yippie of a generation that has spawned its share of yuppies. But the Hoffman spirit lives on. Before his death, in an interview with freelance writer Craig Unger, Hoffman spoke of his youngest son, America, then age 18, and said, "He’s been kicked out of class seven times already. I’m very proud of him."
In our culture we have cultivated a mentality which has trouble understanding what many would call blind devotion to authority. After all, we live in a democratic society. If we do not like our governmental leaders, we simply vote them out of office. We also live in a free market. If we do not like our supervisor, and he does not treat us the way we want, then we either try to move him out or we move out. If our professor in college doesn’t treat us right, then we drop his course or transfer to another school. If our pastor and church leaders do not tickle our fancy, then we move to another church. If our spouse doesn’t meet our expectations, we divorce him or her. If this is where we are as a society, then it is no wonder that we have trouble understanding authority.
But the key to having authority in our lives is our ability to submit to authority. Our text today gives us an amazing insight to this very subject. It is the story of a man who understood both being under authority and exercising authority. And it is the only place that in Scripture where Jesus is so amazed at what He sees that He comments on someone’s faith.
When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. "Lord," he said, "my servant lies at home paralyzed and in terrible suffering." Jesus said to him, "I will go and heal him." The centurion replied, "Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it." When Jesus heard this, he was astonished and said to those following him, "I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith. I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the subjects of the kingdom will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Then Jesus said to the centurion, "Go! It will be done just as you believed it would." And his servant was healed at that very hour. (Matthew 8:5-13)
Here was a man who understood authority. When Jesus offered to come to his home and heal his servant the centurion said that Jesus did not have to do that. The reason he gave was that he understood authority. He was a man who was in authority himself, who was under authority, and who had learned to use authority. This centurion saw in Jesus the authority of God, and he also saw himself in relation to that authority. He said that he was not even worthy to have Jesus in his house. You see, this centurion saw in Jesus ultimate authority because Jesus was under the authority of God. And so he told Jesus to just say the word. He knew that if Jesus were to simply give the command that things would happen. All Jesus needed to do was just say the word.
Jesus was so impressed with this centurion’s understanding of authority that He said that He had not seen faith like this in all of Israel. Here was a man who had learned to be a follower and had himself gained authority by learning obedience. He came to Jesus because he saw the authority of God. He humbly submitted to that authority and all he wanted was for Jesus to just say the word.
Let me ask you a question. Do you want authority? Would you like to be someone who has authority and can exercise authority? Would you like to have the authority to be victorious in your own personal life — to conquer bad habits and to defeat the demonic forces which come against you? All of us would. But there is only one way to have authority — we must be under authority. We must become a just say the word follower of Jesus Christ.
I must admit that deep down within me I really want to be that kind of person. I want to be a just say the word follower of Jesus Christ. And I believe that any person who has made a commitment to Christ has that desire. There is something so appealing and so exciting about making a full commitment to something. We admire people who are fully dedicated and committed to some project, or person, or endeavor. There is something ennobling about it. When we say, "I’m going to give this my all," and when we do, we feel good about ourselves and it causes our spirits to soar.
When we think about our relation to Christ, do we see ourselves as a just say the word follower? While we want to give Jesus our all, have we? We want to be a totally committed follower of Christ. Deep down inside we want Jesus to make a difference in everything we do. We want our relationship with Him to impact our decision making, our money management, our vocabulary, our relationships, and everything else we do in living our lives. We want to be totally surrendered to His sovereignty and leadership. This is what it means to be a just say the word follower of Christ.
Perhaps you can identify with being a just say the word follower of Christ. This is what you are striving for every day. You are not perfect. You fail. But you pick yourself up and dust yourself off and place your hand back in the hand of Jesus and the desire returns and you are back on the path. Maybe you have settled that commitment. Praise the Lord for that.
Unfortunately, many do not demonstrate that commitment by their actions. Perhaps, as you have been listening your pulse rate has quickened, and something inside of you has become disturbed. You may have to say that you have not become a just say the word follower of Christ. For whatever reasons, you have never come to the place where you have totally surrendered to His authority. You may have made some commitments, but you have pulled up short and have not totally surrendered all to Him. You are defining the terms on which you obey Him. In our American churches there are many people just like this. I believe that this is the reason why so many in our churches have no authority or power in their own lives. They have no authority to live because they have not fully come under the authority of Jesus Christ.
If you have not yet given Jesus your all, I can’t help but wonder why. Why is this so? Now, if you are still a seeker — one who is still checking Christianity out — then I understand perfectly well why you haven’t made a total commitment to Christ. You may not yet understand what Jesus really did for you on the Cross. You haven’t yet understood just how much you matter to God. I can understand your situation. But, if you’re someone who calls yourself a Christian, who understands how much Jesus loves you as evidenced by what He did on the Cross in dying for you, who understands His total devotion to you every second of every day, how can you be content with only a casual commitment to Him?
Let me explore three possible reasons why you may not be fully committed to Him — why you may not be a just say the word follower of Christ. The first possible explanation is that you may have a knowledge problem. Perhaps you simply have never been taught just how important total devotion is.
There is an interesting passage in 1 Kings 11. It is the story of Solomon, the wisest man in the world. Unfortunately, this story is not about his wisdom. God had told Solomon not to take foreign women as wives. Solomon, however, chose to disobey God and marry many foreign wives. Solomon did not have simply one foreign wife, he had many. If fact, he had one thousand women. Now, this is not just slipping a foreign wife in the side door of the palace. This is a major problem.
The result of Solomon’s disobedience was that his heart turned away from God. Listen to what the Scripture says in 1 Kings 11:4: "As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been." God judged Solomon because he was not fully devoted to Him.
There is a simple conclusion that we can draw from Solomon’s story. It teaches us that 95% devotion is 5% short. God is not interested in anything less than 100% devotion to Him. God desires that we follow Him fully. God desires hearts that are fully devoted to Him. When Jesus called his followers, he fully expected them to leave everything and follow Him. There are so many passages of Scripture which are absolutely crystal clear about our need to be totally devoted to Christ that we would not be able to read them in this hour. According to the Scripture, our commitment to Christ must be so total, our love for him so fervent, that all other commitment and all other loves look like hate in comparison. If you have a knowledge problem, then simply read the New Testament.
The second reason why you may not be totally devoted to Christ is that you may have a trust problem. You may not believe that if you give Jesus your all you will be better off as a result. You may think that you may lose more than you gain. Simply put, you may not trust in the goodness of God.
Perhaps you’ve played this out in your mind. You really can’t talk about it. Who are you going to talk about it to? But you may be thinking that if you really become a just say the word follower of Christ, that if you obey Him completely, go where He wants you to go, do what He wants you to do, let go of what He wants you to drop, serve where He wants you to serve, give what He wants you to give, confess what He wants you to confess, reconcile with whom He asks you to reconcile, you might come to the end of your life and feel ripped off. It is a fair question. Can you really trust that God will give you a life worth living?
The disciples struggled with this as well. At one point Peter came to Jesus and said, "We have left everything and followed you!" Peter was saying, "Lord, we have given up everything. We have staked our lives on you. What about us?" Listen to Jesus’ answer: "I tell you the truth," Jesus replied, "no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age (homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—and with them, persecutions) and in the age to come, eternal life." (Mark 10:29-30) What Jesus is saying is that, when we come into his family, we gain far more than we give. The return on investment is incredible.
Ultimately, you are going to have to test this for yourself. But let me say that while I have never even heard of one person who was fully devoted to Christ lying on their death bed angry at God for letting them down, I have certainly heard of and read about people who sold their soul for lesser dreams, who gave themselves to pleasure and material things, and found themselves on their death beds pleading with God for a do-over. I pray that you have the courage to take that step of faith and trust God with your life completely.
The final reason why you may not be following Christ fully is not that you have a knowledge problem or a trust problem, but that you have a character problem. There are some people who genuinely desire to follow Christ fully but simply don’t know how to make a commitment. They never learned the basic skills of following through on a commitment made. It was never taught or modeled for them as their character was being formed in their early years growing up. So, they have no idea how real commitment works, and they have developed no skills for making and following through on commitments. It is a defect in character.
The tragedy is that some people don’t even know that they are not committed. I remember having a conversation with a lady in this church. She was telling me how her neighbors commented on the fact that every time they saw her she was on her way to church. I thought to myself that she was going to another church! She was certainly not attending here very regularly. But she was talking about going to this church! I was amazed. She actually believed that she was coming to church all the time when in fact she only came about half the time. Some people have no clue as to what real commitment is. They have defined casual commitment as true commitment. Perhaps they have done so because true commitment was never built into their character. Perhaps it was never modeled in their parent’s marriage at home, or in their parent’s commitment to a job, or in their parent’s commitment to church. Maybe their friends were aimless, without any real direction or commitment in life. For whatever reason, the essentials in making and keeping commitments were not built into their character. It is not a heart problem. They want to make a commitment. It is a character problem. They can’t seem to find a way to follow through.
How about you? Are you finding it difficult to follow through on the commitment that you have made to Christ? It takes more than wishful thinking. You can sit and hope and wish and pray and yearn, but until you build into your life the tools that will enable you to follow through, you simply never will.
So what can we do about becoming a just say the word follower of Jesus? The first thing you need to do is to make a commitment, if you have not. Actually, what I am talking about is coming to the place in your life where you surrender to Jesus Christ. Knowing that He expects you to devote yourself fully to Him, you must come to the place where you are willing to trust Him with your life. Then you must nail that down. By that I mean that you must formally commit or recommit yourself to Jesus Christ. There must be that defining moment of surrender.
Then you must do some things that will place you under His authority. You may be thinking that making a commitment does that. But that is a misconception. Unless there is placed into your life some method of becoming accountable, claiming to be under the authority of Christ is just talk. Christianity is relationships. It is a relationship with God lived out in the context of a community of God’s people. This means that we must enter into truly Christian relationships with others. We must build into our lives ways to be accountable for how we live our Christian lives. We must enter into relationships with others who can help us be accountable.
How can you do that? Let me suggest two ways. One way is that you can become a part of a small group. In this small group, you can make a commitment that you will be open and honest and transparent about your walk with God. This group can become your support group. There you can find encouragement, support, and even an occasional rebuke when you need it.
Another way to become accountable is to find another believer who will hold you accountable. You can enter into a discipleship arrangement with that person where you meet and share with one another in an open and honest way with a view to holding one another accountable.
Let me suggest that the best arrangement would be to have both these things going on at once. Being in a small group and having one person with whom to share on a more intimate level will help you to be under authority. Of course, it all depends on you, and your willingness to be open and honest. But when you come under authority, you will find that you have authority to live your life the way it should be lived.
So, how about it? Do you want to become a just say the word follower of Jesus Christ? Is God speaking to your heart right now? If He is, then you have a decision to make. Remember, 95% commitment is 5% short. Become a just say the word follower of Christ today. Give Him your all. Whatever God is asking you to do right now, the correct answer is yes!
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