Read Luke 14 at Bible Gateway.
There is a chiastic structure in which begins in Luke 14:
Luk 14:7-35
1A: Luk 14:7-11, Whoever humbles himself will be exalted;
1B: Luk 14:12-14, When giving a feast, invite those who cannot repay;
Central axis: Luk 14:15, Now when one of those who sat at the table with Him heard these things, he said to Him, “Blessed is he who shall eat bread in the kingdom of God!”
2B: Luk 14:16-24, Parable of the poor brought to in to the great feast;
2A: Luk 14:25-35, Counting the cost of discipleship.
How is counting the cost of discipleship pair as a matching element with he who humbles himself will be exalted? Because humbling ourselves is part of the cost of discipleship. A disciple of Yeshua cannot exalt himself, for Yeshua did not exalt Himself. Yeshua humbled Himself and He was exalted by the Father.
While we are on the topic of counting the cost, what does Jesus mean when He says that if you do not hate father and mother or wife and children, you cannot be His disciple? Jesus is not teaching us to hate our family. We know, because elsewhere in Scripture we are commanded to honor our father and mother, and to love our wives as Messiah loves the Church and gave Himself for her. Truth never contradicts itself, so if our interpretation was correct it would harmonize with the rest of Scripture.
Matthew records this same teaching in his gospel a little differently, which brings clarity to the issue:
He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it. Mat 10:37-39
Jesus is not teaching us to hate our family, but to love Him preeminently above even our love for our family, above even the love we have for our own life. If our father and mother, or wife or children, came to us to encourage us to forsake Christ, we cannot love them so much that we comply.
Being a disciple of Jesus will cost us everything, even our lives. We lay down our own life in order to take up His life, His eternal life, that He is giving us. There are lots of ways to lay down our lives without someone martyring us. If we get into an argument with our spouse today, do we exalt our own position and rights, or do we humble ourselves, and lay down our rights for the sake of Messiah Yeshua? We all are afforded many opportunities every day to humble ourselves, and lay down our lives because we are following the example of Messiah Yeshua! Watch for them today!
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