Problem: Jesus clearly states, “So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions” (Lk. 14:33). Some believers use this passage to claim that wealthy Christians are not true believers in Christ. Is this the case?

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Problem: Jesus says, “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. 28 For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it?” (Lk. 14:26-28) Lordship theologian John MacArthur writes, “The idea of daily self-denial does not jibe with the contemporary supposition that believing in Jesus is a momentary decision. A true believer is one who signs up for life… It means nothing is knowingly held back, nothing purposely shielded from His lordship, nothing stubbornly kept from His control.”[1] Does this passage support Lordship theology?

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Problem: Regarding this passage, atheist Richard Dawkins writes,

Jesus’ family values, it has to be admitted, were not such as one might wish to focus on. He was short, to the point of brusqueness, with his own mother, and he encouraged his disciples to abandon their families to follow him. ‘If any man come to me and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.’ The American comedian Julia Sweeney expressed her bewilderment in her one-woman stage show, Letting Go of God: ‘Isn’t this what cults do? Get you to reject your family in order to inculcate you?[1]

How might we respond to this accusation?

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Problem: Jesus taught, “And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him” (Lk. 12:10). What does it mean to blaspheme the Holy Spirit? Does this mean that a Christian can lose their salvation if they do this?

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