What's Burning in Your Bones: Costly Discipleship

The hard words of Jesus come without much padding. Jesus says a disciple is like a slave, that he has not come to bring peace but a sword, and that households may be divided from the inside out. The lectionary puts that text on Father’s Day, not with “honor your father and mother,” but with son against father and daughter against mother. The difficulty is not something to explain away into comfort. The difficulty may be a gift, because family is difficult too.

Family can hold real love and real disappointment at the same time. Family can mean grief over children who have drifted from the faith, tension around tables, severed relationships, illness, screw ups, and love that costs more than anyone expected. Scripture that only soothed would have very little to say to actual complicated lives. The hard and unresolved parts may not be problems to solve, but truth to receive.

Jesus speaks into a world where family and religion were the same fabric. First century Jewish households held faith, identity, loyalty, and public belonging together. Roman households also carried religious and legal authority through the male head of the house. So when Jesus says he will set son against father, he is naming a real structural cost. Choosing Jesus could mean disinheritance, being cast out, and standing against the loyalty systems that organized daily life.

The sword Jesus names is not violence to seek. The sword is what can happen when truth meets a world organized around conformity. The cross is not just a phrase for handling inconvenience with grace. The cross was Roman execution technology, a public warning for people who challenged empire. Jesus’ call to take up the cross means following him even when faith moves toward costly truth.

Jesus also pushes back on the measurements that quietly take over faith. The question is not whether a family looks Christian or whether a church looks successful. The question is what costly, burning in the bones truth is calling, and whether that call will be followed. The point was never to build the biggest church. The point was to make disciples who live their faith in the messy, difficult, beautiful human life already given.

Carla’s foster and adoptive family becomes a picture of faith functioning beyond expected form. Her family did not fit a traditional mold, but its function was costly, committed, and seeking wholeness. Concurrent foster care offers the same kind of witness: love opens the home while holding the child loosely enough to honor reunification. Faith may look less like possession and more like love that refuses to control.

Jeremiah’s fire shut up in his bones names that kind of call. Bones do not grow stronger in comfort; they grow through strain and weight. Difficult texts, families, and churches can work the same way, not comfortable, but informative and animating. Jesus does not promise immunity, but accompaniment: the sparrows live and die, yet God sees, values, and stays near.

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Key Takeaways

• 1. Difficulty can be a gift. The difficult words of Jesus are not softened into something easier. The text is allowed to stay troubling because real family life often stays troubling too. Faith that cannot sit with grief, tension, and unfinished pain will have little to say to the lives people actually live. [26:09]
• 2. The cross is not inconvenience. The cross was not a symbol of ordinary hardship for the first hearers. The cross was Rome’s public tool of execution, used to warn anyone who challenged imperial power. Jesus’ call to take it up means that discipleship can move a person toward costly truth, not merely toward graceful patience. [31:47]
• 3. Faithfulness is not appearance. The question is not whether a family looks Christian or whether a church looks successful. Jesus presses past the measuring and evaluating that can hide inside grief. Faithfulness is found in the function of faith, in whether the life given is being lived toward the truth God has set burning there. [34:48]
• 4. Love does not possess. The foster care picture shows a love that is willing to open the home without claiming ownership over the child’s future. Concurrent planning holds the child closely and loosely at the same time, making reunification part of the love rather than a threat to it. Christian love can become more faithful when it seeks wholeness instead of control. [39:10]
• 5. Strain can strengthen holy bones. Bones do not grow stronger in comfort; resistance builds density. Difficult texts, hard family realities, and costly callings can become the weight that reveals what matters most. The fire in the bones is not always pleasant, but it can tell a person where faith is asking to go.
  
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Youtube Chapters

• [00:00] - Welcome
• [24:14] - Hard Words From Jesus
• [25:19] - Father’s Day And A Difficult Text
• [26:09] - Difficulty As A Gift
• [27:51] - Following Jesus Can Be Challenging
• [28:29] - Family And Faith In Jesus’ Time
• [29:52] - Truth Against Conformity
• [31:24] - Take Up Your Cross
• [32:32] - Losing Life To Find It
• [33:09] - Grief Over Quieter Pews
• [34:48] - The Costly Thing God Calls Toward
• [36:09] - Carla’s Costly Yes
• [38:51] - Foster Care And Holding Loosely
• [40:05] - What Troubles You May Be Telling You
• [41:06] - Fire Shut Up In The Bones
• [42:23] - Strain That Builds Faith
• [43:56] - Sparrows, Cost, And Accompaniment

Bible Reading
Matthew 10:34-39 (ESV)
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

Jeremiah 20:9 (ESV)
“If I say, ‘I will not mention him, or speak any more in his name,’ there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot.”

Matthew 10:29-31 (ESV)
“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.”

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Observation Questions

1. What does Jesus mean when he says he came to bring a “sword” rather than peace (Matthew 10:34)? How does this contrast with common expectations of faith?
2. In the sermon, how was family identity intertwined with religious practice in Jesus’ time? What structural risks did early followers face for choosing discipleship? [28:29]
3. Jeremiah describes God’s word as a “fire shut up in [his] bones.” What does this metaphor reveal about the nature of a costly calling?

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Interpretation Questions

1. Jesus says taking up the cross means following him even if it leads to losing one’s life (Matthew 10:38-39). How might this relate to modern-day choices that require sacrificing comfort, reputation, or control?
2. The sermon mentions foster care as an example of “love that refuses to possess.” How does this model challenge traditional ideas of family or success in faith communities? [39:10]
3. The sparrows in Matthew 10:29-31 are called “valued” by God even as they live and die. How does this image reframe the relationship between suffering and divine care?

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Application Questions

1. What “burning in the bones” truth or calling have you felt but hesitated to pursue because of fear of conflict or loss? How might Jesus’ words about the cross encourage you?
2. Family tensions or grief over drifting faith were named as realities in the sermon. [33:09] How can we practice holding these struggles without measuring faithfulness by appearances or outcomes?
3. The sermon compares bones growing stronger under strain to faith refined through difficulty. What unresolved challenge in your life might be an invitation to trust God’s accompaniment rather than seek quick solutions?
4. Reflect on a relationship where you’ve tried to “control” outcomes (e.g., a child’s faith journey, a fractured friendship). How could “holding loosely” look in practice? What would need to change?
5. Jesus’ call to lose one’s life to find it (Matthew 10:39) often clashes with cultural values of security or success. Where is God asking you to risk “losing” something familiar to follow Him more fully?