(I Am a Disciple of Jesus Christ) a Disciple Is Other Worldly — Denny Kenaston

Hello, this is Brother Denny. Welcome to Charity Ministries. Our desire is that your life would be blessed and changed by this message. This message is not copyrighted and is not to be bought or sold.

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These messages are offered to all without charge by the freewill offerings of God's people. A special thank you to all who support this ministry. We'll sing our little song here one more time. I just want to remind you as we sing this song for the last time that these verses are promises in the Bible.

They're conditional promises, which, if you'll notice, most of the promises in the Bible are conditional. But these are conditional promises. But they are promises that God will meet. He is a covenant-keeping God, and He will meet them.

So I hope that you will not only take a little song home in your heart, but grasp the reality of the promises that are in these verses and live them out in your lives. Okay.

Humble yourselves in the sight of God.

Thank you this morning for giving us such a beautiful opportunity last evening to practice these verses. Thank you, Father. Thank you for your loving kindness to us. Thank you, God, for bringing us to this last session.

O Lord, we worship you for all the many things you've taught us through these days. And pray that you will open up the eyes of our understanding again this morning, God, that we may truly be the disciples of Jesus Christ.

In the midst of a very mixed-up Christian world, Lord, would you raise up true disciples of Jesus Christ from these young people, Lord, and us older ones also. In Jesus Christ's name, Amen. You may be seated.

All right. It's hard to believe we've come to the last session of these teachings. The session today, the title for these four confessions of a true disciple, is this. A disciple is otherworldly. A disciple is otherworldly.

So today, young people, I'm going to tell you how you can be worldly. Otherworldly. I think that all that we have looked at so far this week, if we were to write them all down and draw a line under it and give the sum total of it all, I think that we would all agree the sum total is a person who is otherworldly.

Otherworldly. The professing church in America today would tell us that there are 60 million born-again Christians in our land. Several youth asked me this week, am I making a difference between a Christian and a disciple?

And I quickly answered them back, no, I am not. There is no difference between a Christian and a disciple. Those are synonymous words in the Bible. They were called disciples all the way through Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and you will find the word disciple all the way up into Acts chapter 21.

It was only in Antioch where they were first called Christians. But there is no difference between a Christian and a disciple, young people. Well, someone also asked me, so, Brother Denny, does that mean that what you are saying to us is that this is the way that we are supposed to be living, and that if we are not going to live that way, we are really not Christians?

That's right! You got it! It's about time the standard got lifted back up there and somebody started living it so clearly, so unanimously, so beautifully, so powerfully, that the world could look on and say there is a difference between the Christians and the world.

So, young people, do you realize if there were 60 million disciples in this United States of America, that those 60 million disciples could win the rest of the world in six years? Just making one disciple each, every year.

They could win the whole world in six years. There are not 60 million Christians in America, young people. These 60 million born-againers here in the great USA all claim to believe in the doctrine of the separation from the world.

If you ask the world that they are supposed to be separated from, the world's evaluation is that there is no difference between the Christian and the world. What a terrible commentary for the world to write over Christianity.

Our Lord must grieve Himself in heaven over that. Their evaluation is that the Christians look the same as the world. They talk the same as the world. They go to the same places that the world goes to.

They spend their free time the same way the world does. The divorce rate is the same as it is in the world. They don't pay their bills just like the worldly people don't pay theirs. They go to the same movies.

They watch the same TV sets. They hit the same Internet sites that the world does. There is no difference between them. God, deliver us! Deliver us from that! Beloved young people, these things ought not so to be.

This ought not to be that way. That's a terrible commentary. That's not what Jesus died for. No way He gave Himself for us that He might purify unto Himself a peculiar people zealous of good works. Amen?

That's what Jesus died for. There must be something major wrong. Right? I wonder this morning. Are you part of the problem or part of the solution? As you sit here today. Are you part of the problem? Or are you part of the solution?

Hmm? Some of you probably heard me say it before, but I want to say it again. Remember that young lady I sat next to on an airplane some years ago? Remember her? Sat down next to her on an airplane. Had my Bible in my hand.

That sanctifies you real fast on the airplane. Just put your Bible in your hand. And so we started to talk. I thought I'll try to open up a little door here and see if the Lord would open up an opportunity to witness to this young lady.

I asked her, are you a Christian? Oh, sure. I'm a Christian. Yes. I mean, everybody is, right? That's the popular thing these days. So, I learned, you know, that's a pretty weak word here in America. You have to prop it up with a few other words.

So, after she answered that, I said to her, Are you a real Christian? She stopped a moment and looked at me and she said, well, what do you mean? And I said, you know, you love the Lord Jesus with all your heart.

You love the Bible. You go to church. You love to live for God. Oh, she said, no way. I'm not one of those. I'm not one of those. Well, pray tell me, is there any other kind? Oh, I'm not one of those.

I'm one of those other 60 million, you know, that just lives for myself all week long and carry a Bible to church on Sunday and hear some kind of a sermon and say my amens and sing my little hymns and go my merry way and live my selfish self for the rest of the week.

I'm one of those kind. Well, a disciple, young people, is otherworldly. There are four confessions we want to cover here today. The first one is this. I have forsaken the world. I have forsaken the world.

Forsaking the World Through Union With Christ

Paul said it this way so beautifully in the book of Colossians. And it's a good challenge to every one of us. He says this. If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above. Where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.

Set your affection on things above, not on the things of the earth. For ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God. I want to consider just for a moment the word forsake. The word that Jesus used quite a few times when He was laying out His plan for these disciples when He walked on the earth.

He used that word forsake. What does that word mean? It means to leave. It means to abandon. It means to renounce. It means to leave surviving. You get the picture of a boat that is sinking. And if you're in the boat and it's sinking, the only way to save yourself is to forsake the boat.

Amen? That's what the word forsake means. If all of a sudden this platform bursts into flames, if I'm going to save myself, I will forsake the platform. Because the thing's on fire and it's burning. That's what the word forsake means.

Young people, this world is already under judgment. This world is a sinking ship and it's sinking already. And the captain of the sinking ship is the God of this world. It's time to abandon ship. That's what it means to forsake the world.

A disciple recognizes that this world is already under judgment and everything in it is going to burn up. It's very important to be rightly related to something that is going to burn up. Amen? 1 John 2 .15 says, Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.

Neither the things that are in the world. If any men love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. It's not in him. Turn with me to John chapter 8. We'll read just a few verses. It's also interesting to me that the Apostle John said more about the world than all the other writers in the New Testament.

I think he was also the most otherworldly one of them all. I like John. In John chapter 8 and verse 38, Jesus is speaking. I'm sorry, 8 and verse 23. He's speaking to the Pharisees and he says these words.

He says, He said unto them, Ye are from beneath. I am from above. Ye are of this world. I am not of this world. We have to answer that question ourselves. Are we of this world or are we not of this world?

If we're going to join our dear Lord Jesus, our testimony will have to be, I am not of this world. John chapter 15, let's turn there. Verse 18 and 19. Listen to the words of Jesus there. 15, 18 and 19.

He's admonishing his disciples. Before he goes to the cross. And he says these words. If the world hates you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own.

How does the world feel about you? If ye were of the world, the world would love you. But because ye are not of this world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hated you. Good words for Jesus to say to the disciples, because they're going to face lots of trouble in the future.

And also, chapter 16 and verse 33. We'll read that one also. Listen to these words. These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer.

I have overcome the world. Now what Jesus is saying to his disciples is this. You are not going to feel comfortable in the world. If you are with me, you are not of this world. If you are with me, you will not feel comfortable in this world.

If you are with me, the world will not understand you. If you are with me, the world may even hate you. And tribulation will come upon you as you live in this world. Now here's the question. How do you view the world?

The World as a Spiritual Battlefield

Is it a playground? Or a battlefield? A playground? A playground? Or a battlefield? A good place to go and play and have a good old time? Or a battlefield? How do you see it? You know, if God could pull back the veil over our eyes, the veil that separates the spiritual from the material, and we could hear the sounds of agony and dying, we could see the gruesome scenes of people being blown apart spiritually, I think it might change our mind about this world that we live in.

Because I'm afraid many, many young people, they view that world out there as a nice place to go and play. I mean, it's so neat. Oh, dear young people, do you realize there are very few countries in all this big wide world that we live in that are like this one that you grew up in, and the rest of the world lives in poverty?

So we grow up in this prosperous society, we look around us and we just think, Oh boy! One great big playground! What do you want to do today? I'm telling you young people, that is not the way to look at the world.

There sits a young man or a young lady over there in the corner, while you're laughing and frolicking and having a good old time playing with the world in the world. There sits some young man or some young lady, you look at them and in the natural maybe you see a very sad face on them, but if God could pull back the veil of the spiritual and the material, there is a filthy, hairy, ugly demon sitting on that poor soul's back, and he's got his hands wrapped around her neck, and he's screaming deep in her soul, Kill yourself!

Do it now! Go get the rope! Hang it around your neck! And there you are laughing and frolicking and having a good old time in the world out there. I tell you young people, that world out there is a battlefield, and there are literally thousands and millions of demons that you cannot see with your natural eye, and they are out there and they are wounding and killing and devastating people all around us all the time.

How can we go out there and play? Can we do it? I tell you we don't see. God open our eyes! Make us otherworldly! Are you one of those laughing, joking, playing your way through this world like it's some big game?

When God's voice would call out to all of us as children of God and say, Come out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing, and I will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my dear sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.

Refusing Materialism and Mammon

Come out from among them, my people! That thing, that world is under judgment! Take yourself loose of it! I have forsaken the world, number two. The second confession, I will not serve materialism. I will not serve mammon.

I'd like us to read in Matthew chapter six, if we may. Some of the most staggering verses in the New Testament are found in Matthew chapter six. They're very hard on us Americans to read. We don't park on them very long because we don't know what to do with them.

But they're there. Matthew chapter six, verse nineteen and following. As Jesus was giving his first sermon to the disciples, he touched on material things and said to them, Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth where moth and rust doth corrupt and where thieves break through and steal.

But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt and where thieves do not break through nor steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. And where your heart is, that is your treasure.

We can turn that one around, you know. Where's your heart? Listen, he goes on. The context stays right there. The light of the body is the eye of the soul. It's also the eye in your head, but it is the eye of the soul.

The light of the body is the eye of the soul. If therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, set on other things, thy whole body shall be full of darkness.

If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness! No man can serve two masters. You can't do it. For either he will hate the one and love the other or else he will hold to the one and despise the other.

Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Now, we live in a land where men are trying to do this. They are trying and trying and trying and trying! But you can't do it. You cannot serve God and mammon, young people.

Jesus was constantly confronting the souls of men about their values. And I just want to remind you this morning, young people, that most of you have grown up in the midst of a grossly idolatrous materialism.

I don't know if you look at it that way. I'm not sure. But it is that way in this land that we live in. And this call to discipleship must affect your view of money. It must! We have to come to grips with that.

When General Douglas MacArthur returned from Japan after the bombings in World War II, he said to the United States, send me one thousand missionaries and one million Bibles to Japan. Because the people of Japan, in their ignorance, said, your God is stronger than ours.

We want to learn. But guess what, young people? It never happened. It never happened. A whole country said, please. I mean, talk about a Macedonian call. A whole country. Please, it's just about you. It never happened.

Instead of missionaries, we sent them business managers. Instead of Bibles, we sent them the Wall Street Journal. Instead of evangelists, we sent them economists. And instead of churches, we planted corporations all over Japan.

And the Japanese people learned very well who the God of America was. And we made very good disciples out of them. And in fifty years, they went from an absolutely devastated nation to one of the most prosperous nations in the world.

But nobody wanted to leave their comfortableness and go win those souls to Jesus Christ. And it's still that way today, isn't it? Young people, do you realize there may be another call coming down the pipe not far away when a whole country called Afghanistan says, send us missionaries?

Who's going to go? It's hot over there. And I'm not talking about extremes of poverty where you don't take care of yourself and you don't take care of your own. I'm not talking about that. But we, young people, we live in a land where it is easy to make money.

It's a breeze to make money. That's no big accomplishment. Some of you young men, maybe you have your sights set on those things. That's a piece of cake. Don't you think you're doing something hot if you've figured out how to make money?

That's a breeze in America. It's time that we make half as much money spending half as much time and spend the rest of it seeking the kingdom of God and building His kingdom. Instead of saying, oh boy, we live in America, we can really make a lot of money.

I'm going to make this much and I'm going to build this much. You need to say, I think I'll just do about half speed. God has given us financial freedom, young people. God has graced us with time freedom like no other people in the whole wide world.

We are so time free compared to the rest of the world. They spend literally 18 hours a day just surviving from one day to the next. They hardly have any free time. We have it. What are we going to do with it?

Play it away? Or pray it away? Which one, young people? Which one? Oh, God help us. Open our eyes. You young people, you're in that stage, you know, where you're evaluating. You just re-evaluate your view of money.

Don't follow the spirit of this age. Don't do it. And sometimes, even don't follow the spirit of your father. Let me give you my testimony. Something the Lord has been dealing with me about. I came to this area here where I lived 20 years ago.

And I saw all these industrious businessmen all around me. And I took courage to start a little family business so I could work with my sons. And that was my motivation. I want to work with my sons. I saw these other men all around here working with their boys.

I saw the boys standing right next to the father and they were working together. And I said, God, I want that. I'm ashamed to say, as we began to gain, my mind was more and more on making money. See, I grew up in the city.

And I never... I planned to be a laborer all the rest of my days. I never even dreamed I'd ever do anything else. But then when I realized, hey, this money gets made pretty easy. My mind started thinking like that.

I get all these ideas on how to make money. Read the business magazines. Oh, that was normal, hey. All the men talk about business and making money and this deal and that deal. And I was just following everybody else.

But about two, two and a half years ago, the Lord led me to spend 150 days in the Sermon on the Mount. Now, that's a powerful sermon to spend 150 days in. Powerful. One-fourth of the Sermon on the Mount deals with money.

I didn't know all that. I just felt led by God to spend 150 days in the Sermon on the Mount. And for 150 days, I went through the whole sermon meditatively, carefully, reflectively, all the way through it every day for 150 days.

And at the end of it, I wasn't the same. I wasn't the same. I started thinking the same thoughts as before. I'd see something, you know, I'd be driving somewhere and I'd see something and I'd think, Boy, that'd be a good way to, that, that, you could build a business on that.

And these thoughts started going through my mind and all of a sudden this, this sick, grievous feeling started settling down over my heart. And I found myself feeling empty on the inside and I just, I realized God has changed me.

I didn't even know it. I didn't know what He was going to do. But God has changed me. And I don't look at it that way anymore. And it's not right to look at it that way. I'm not saying you can't have a business.

I'm not saying you can't make money. I'm not saying that. I'm just saying we need to make our values in line with His book. That's what I'm saying. The Word of God changed me. And I hope you let the Word of God change you.

While you're young and formative and teachable and open, you let the Word of God change your views on money. And I hope that every one of you young men will rise up and seek the kingdom of God and build God's kingdom.

And be like the Apostle Paul who made tents. Amen. He did. But he didn't build the biggest tent-making business in Ephesus, young men. That was not his goal, was it? A means to an end to preach the gospel.

I hope you'll look at it that way, young men. Number three. The third confession of otherworldliness. I will join myself to other disciples. I will join myself to other disciples. I'd like us to turn to John chapter 13 for a reading there.

Joining Fellow Disciples in the Church

Precious verses in John 13. Just turn there quickly. John 13, 34 and 35. This is in the beginning of one long sermon. John 13, 14, 15, 16. And the prayer is John 17 at the end of the sermon. But in the middle of that sermon, Jesus says these words to his disciples.

A new commandment I give unto you. That ye love one another as I have loved you. That ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples if ye have love one to another. Now, Jesus is giving a definition of the new commandment.

This is the new commandment of love in the New Testament. I mentioned it earlier this week, but here he's giving the definition of it. The new love. The new definition of love is that we are to love one another in the way that he loved.

And Jesus went to the cross and laid down his life for you and I. That's the new commandment. And Jesus is saying to his disciples here, this is one of the ways that the world will know that you are my disciples.

If you have love one for another. Now, we could have surely put this category under the disciple and his neighbors. But this is a closer relationship. This one is closer. Your neighbor, he just lives next door to you.

Your neighbor, that's the guy you may witness to out on the street corner. Your neighbor may be those people that you deal with over there in Africa on a missionary trip. But now we're talking about brothers and sisters.

Fellow disciples. Jesus joined his disciples together in a communion of believers. All the days that he was there discipling those men, he was connecting them together, wasn't he? Most of the time they were together.

He did that on purpose. They call it koinonia in the New Testament. That's close, intimate fellowship, young people. The Bible calls us, us, the disciples of Jesus Christ. The Bible calls us the church.

You'll find that word. Jesus spoke it in Matthew chapter 16 when he said, On this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. You find it again in Matthew 18, but that's the only two places you'll find it until you get to the book of Acts.

In Acts chapter 2 on the day of Pentecost, it says, And the Lord added unto the church daily, such as should be saved. And from there on you see it. Church, church, church, church, church, all the way through Acts.

And all the way through the epistles. That word church in the Greek is ekklesia. That Greek word means the called out ones. We are the called out ones. But we are not just the called out one. Amen? There's a difference between being a called out one and being the called out one.

We are the called out one, young people. We are the church, the ekklesia. Called out of the world, yes, but called into a fellowship of believers. This is one of the most powerful, all-inclusive principles in the New Testament.

Surely we don't want to miss this one. We don't want to miss it. I will join myself to other disciples. We are a called out group of believers who have been called into a brotherhood. And the Lord Jesus Christ is our elder brother.

Now, the mystery of the church, Paul uses that term many times. The mystery of the church. The mystery of the called out ones. The mystery of the called in ones. Called out of the world, called into fellowship.

Paul calls it the manifold wisdom of God. Many-folded wisdom of God is the ekklesia, young people. That means there are dozens of beautiful principles that are hidden in that word, ekklesia. It is not good to be alone, young people.

I know there are many troubling circumstances and even as I stand here and you sit and listen, some of you don't know what to do. I know that. Some of you don't know where to go to church. I know that so.

Some of you, your moms and dads visited 20 churches and finally gave up and they're sitting at home. And Sunday morning they say a prayer and push a button and listen to a cassette. And I know that. And I understand all those things.

But I'm telling you, I need to tell you the truth anyway. I want to be very careful and sensitive, yet I must tell you the truth. This is a week-long subject. And I'm taking ten minutes on it. But I want you to know, young people, that one of the marks of a true disciple is they join themselves to the other disciples.

It is not good to be alone. I believe that God can keep you when you're alone. I believe that God can come in and protect you. But I don't believe you can be alone for year after year after year. You are missing something.

And it's not a little something, young people. I know you all here, you have fathers and mothers. Your fathers and mothers have to deal with all of this. I understand that while I'm saying this. But still I want to tell you that God's heart is that you be connected with other disciples.

There's so much that is missed when you are alone. Like all of God's wisdom and principles, there are hidden blessings, and they are many-folded. Hidden blessings that you don't even realize you are missing because you are not getting them.

You don't realize you're missing them until all of a sudden you find yourself connected with a body of believers. And then all of a sudden you realize, Oh my, how much grace I was missing. My life is blessed and I'm prospering and I'm growing in ways that I never did before.

I'm seeing needs in my life that I never saw when I was sitting there all by myself like a monk on the top of a mountain. There are seventeen one-anothers in the New Testament. I don't want you to miss all seventeen of those blessings.

You can't do them when you're by yourself, young people. And those one-anothers are not relating to a world around you. That's talking about one-anothering among the believers, the fellow disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ.

We are to be one-anothering all the time. It's beautiful. The manifold wisdom of God. How can we keep the New Commandment if we are all by ourselves? We can't do it. And there is a big difference between relating lightly and briefly in the world around us, and relating closely and for many years with brothers and sisters.

There's a big difference. You know what I mean? When you start relating for years with brothers and sisters, they learn to know you and you learn to know them. And guess what? We're not so hot. We have needs.

We have flat spots. There are things where we need to see and grow in. God needs to sanctify us more and more. Well, when you start dwelling together with believers for a couple of years, all of a sudden, it looks a bit different.

And God can work in your life if you will let Him. God, Christ, has joined us in a body and left us in the world. He has joined us together in a body, one body, and left us in the world to be a testimony, to be a city that is set on a hill, to be the manifestation of Christ in the community where we live.

That can't be done by one. It must be done by a body, young people. By a body. Well, enough said on that. Lastly, and surely not the least, but the most, the fourth confession and the last confession of these sessions, I will abide in Jesus Christ continually.

Abiding in Jesus Christ Continually

I am a disciple of Jesus Christ and I will abide in Jesus Christ continually. This is what I call the other half of the doctrine of separation, young people. This is the other half. Yes, we are separated from the world.

We are to separate ourselves from the world. But young people, we are not just to separate ourselves from the world. We are to be separated unto God. That's the other half of separation, amen? And it makes the whole thing make sense.

I mean, there's so many mixed up, confusing ideas about this. I mean, some people, they think, OK, I'm going to do this, and I'm going to put this on, and I'm going to grow some of this, and I'm going to put some black shoes on, and I'm going to walk around out that world out there, and I'm separated from the world.

No, you're not! If you're not separated, you were if you had long hair and red shoes on. You're not separated unto God. You want to be otherworldly? You need to be connected to the spirit of the other world, amen?

That's the only way I know to be otherworldly. I will abide in Jesus Christ continually, separated from the world and separated unto God. John 13 -17. You'll notice that Jesus, maybe John already told you this, but Jesus shifted His teachings of His disciples in John 13, because He realized it's about time for Me to pass out of this world.

And these disciples need to know a few deeper things. Because I want to continue this Master-Disciple relationship with My disciples, I'm going to have to teach them a few of the deeper inner things, because I am going back to My Father.

And so, the teachings shifted, because He knew that His hour had come. And the Master-Learner relationship changes to the voice of the Spirit of God in the inner man. And Jesus knew that they must learn how this relationship will continue.

And that's why He began to speak to them in chapter 14 and 15 and 16 about the Spirit of God and the Comforter and all of those things, and continuing with us. And He spoke to them about fellowship. The Father and I will come.

We'll manifest ourselves unto you. We'll make our abode with you. Beautiful words. Very different than what they heard up until then. But truly, a disciple of Jesus Christ must learn this lesson, because our Lord Jesus is not here.

You cannot see Him anymore. You can't run up to Him and ask Him. You can't go to Him when you need bread. He's not there. You can't walk up to Him and say, Lord, here's a man who's in trouble. Would you do something about it?

You can't do that anymore. You can't see Him. So what are we going to do? We're going to have to learn what it means to be a New Testament disciple after Jesus has gone to the cross, went to the grave, went through the resurrection, and ascended up to the right hand of the Majesty on high, and poured out His Holy Spirit upon the church.

How does all that work? Jesus speaks of that in John 15. He says, I am the true vine. I am the true vine. In verse 4 He says, Abide in Me. Abide in Me. And I in you. Let Me abide in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye, except ye abide in Me.