Luke 14:27-29 English Standard Version

27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. 28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him,

Show ourselves to be faithful to our Lord and they will still mock us. So if our choices are to be mocked for being unfaithful or being faithful, then mock me for being faithful.

One thing that occurs to me about being mocked is that we will know how others feel. It is easier to deal with a lost soul if we know where they stand.

Has life treated them so unfairly as to have been cursed without reason? It might be that something happened to them that turned their hope into sour grapes. As we deal with lost souls we will find they also have a tale to tell about how they came to a point of mocking what is right.

Are they worth the time and trouble to listen to them and discover where in life they lost hope? Our Lord says we should at least give them a chance so that after listening and understanding we might be given the chance to speak a word of truth and allow the truth to do what truth does best.

• Jeremiah 50:6
  “My people have been lost sheep. Their shepherds have led them astray, turning them away on the mountains. From mountain to hill they have gone. They have forgotten their fold.
  
• Matthew 18:12
  What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray?

They do not know they are lost until someone finds them.Who is looking for them?

Jeremiah 17:5-10 English Standard Version

5 Thus says the Lord: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength,    whose heart turns away from the Lord.

6 He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come.He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.

7 “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.

8 He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.”

9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

10 “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways,
according to the fruit of his deeds.”

A tree that is not fed by the Waters is nothing but a shrub.

Bless us O Lord and plant us by the Living Waters. Amen!

Our only hope is that God’s Word is true and that we stand with God in believing by faith in His Son and the promises the Father has made in Christ. If we are connected, we are blessed. If we trust in our own strength we are without hope.

God knows our hearts and He knows our minds. There is no hiding from the all knowing God.

If we think we can hide from Him we delude ourselves. Fantasies of fantasies is the vanity of man, to think we should find hope in anything except the promises of God.

God provides for our needs not our wants.

How many sacrifices do we have to make to get what we want?

What we do not take into account in those sacrifices are the cost to our soul and this relationship we have with God the Father and Jesus the Son.

Luke 14:27-29 English Standard Version

27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. 28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him,