No Looking Back
About this sermon
Pastor Dean Odle uses an old family plow to illustrate Jesus’s warning in Luke 9:62 about following Him without looking back. Beginning with Romans 8 and John 10, he argues that discipleship requires continually hearing Christ’s voice, resisting the flesh, and surrendering self-will. He examines the excuses in Luke 14, shares personal accounts of ministry decisions, correction, and restoration, and turns to 1 John 2 and Proverbs 3 to urge trust in God’s direction. The sermon closes with warnings drawn from Lot’s wife and the parable of the talents, calling listeners to examine their faith, abide in Christ, and move forward in obedient, fruitful service.
Chronological teaching outline
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Odle opens with the purpose of seeking God: knowing His will and hearing His voice. Displaying his great-grandfather’s old plow, he reads Romans 8:12–14 and argues that new birth begins a life of growth, repentance, self-control, and Spirit-led obedience.
Reading John 10:27–28 and Luke 9:57–62, Odle argues that Christ’s promises belong to people who continue hearing and following Him. He examines three would-be disciples and Jesus’s warning about putting a hand to the plow and looking back.
Odle applies Jesus’s call to immediate obedience, recounts Abraham’s willingness to surrender Isaac, and warns against making family approval or personal desires into idols. He discusses habitual sin and presents Jesus’s prayer in Gethsemane as the model for yielding one’s own will.
Using the work of keeping a plow straight, Odle urges converts to grow strong in Christ rather than trying to repair every past failure by their own strength. He describes family difficulties and his move to Washington, D.C., as examples of following what he understood to be God’s direction.
Odle begins Luke 14’s parable of the great supper and examines excuses involving property, work, and marriage. He argues that obedience affects other people as well as oneself, recalls Charles Finney’s emphasis on eternal consequences, and distinguishes active ministry from prayerful waiting.
Odle recounts postponing a book he believed God had told him to write. He describes an Achilles tendon injury, the subsequent months of recovery, and completing The Polluted Church, interpreting the experience as correction for making excuses. He reminds listeners that they belong to Christ.
Returning to Luke 14:21–27, Odle discusses the rejected invitations and Christ’s demand for allegiance above family and one’s own life. He describes pastoral decisions, his debate with Greg Locke, and a flat-earth conference appearance, presenting them as examples of seeking specific direction rather than fame. His judgments about participants are his own assertions.
Odle contrasts seeking recognition with faithfulness, then reads 1 John 2:15–17 and Proverbs 3:5–9,11. He argues that love of the world and self-directed plans conflict with discipleship, and emphasizes acknowledging God in every decision and accepting His correction.
Odle describes praying before ministry-school discipline and encouraging people to seek God before moving or enrolling. He discusses fear, control, the church’s building permit, financial uncertainty, and the importance of choices made by younger listeners. These accounts illustrate his call to trust God’s direction.
Odle warns that obedience does not guarantee ease. He invokes Jesus’s resurrection and Job, recounts a difficult period and later restoration in his own life, and discusses Judas and betrayal. He insists that perceived spiritual direction must agree with Scripture and defines courage as obeying despite fear.
Odle contrasts passing earthly pleasures with eternal life, recalls Jesus’s warning about gaining the world and losing one’s soul, and uses Lot’s wife to illustrate a heart attached to Sodom. He offers his own historical and contemporary claims, warns against lukewarm allegiance, and uses a shepherd-and-lamb illustration to call listeners closer to Christ.
Odle urges listeners to examine their faith, crucify fleshly desires, and remain within the Shepherd’s voice. The parable of the talents and John 15 frame his appeal to faithful, fruitful service. He closes by praying for listeners to hear God’s voice, surrender self-will, and move forward without looking back.
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- 0:12:41
Well, that kind of goes along with what we're going to do this morning. Amen to that. All right. Well, let's y'all can be seated this morning. We want to welcome you to Fire and Grace Church. But why do we seek God? Just for the sake of seeking or that we find him and hear something. We seek God so we can hear from him and we can know his will for our lives. That's all that matters. Romans 8, we're going to start there. Romans 8. Y'all see I brought my this thing right here is probably this is an old plow that of my great-grandfather’s probably over 100 years old. because I know in the 1960s 1959 where he moved where into the house that I inherited that he left to me. I found these in the barn. about by that time they were using tractors and plowing, but before that they would hook up an ox or a mule or horses or whatever they had to one of these. And this one even still has I don't know if you guys can see it or not. Hey, why don't you pick up that end for me down there, Jordan? This thing has got some weight to it. As you can see, still got where the plow and it still got where you hook up the horse or the mule or the you just laying them down there. And I thought, huh, yeah, found that in the old barn. And we're going to get to what that's about. But this is what it says. Romans 8:14. And actually, well, actually, we're going to back up and read verse 12 through 14. Of course, the context of Romans 8 is living your life by the spirit of God and not by your flesh or your carnal mind. That's the context. And then he says, "Therefore, brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh to live after the flesh or what our body or emotions or feelings desire." He says, "For if you live after the flesh, you shall die. And that just means you will be separated from God forever. But if you through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live. For as many as are led by the spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
- 0:15:19
Now notice that he puts mortifying the deeds of the body, meaning getting control of your physical body and not letting it do whatever it wants, right? self-control, fruit of the spirit, temperance, repentance from sin, habitual sin, self-control, right? And then he says it's connected to though the very next verse he adds, for as many as are led by the spirit of God, they are the sons of God. Because the whole purpose of this exercise that we draw near to the Lord that we seek him is so that we may hear his voice and be led by his spirit. If we are led by the spirit then we will not fulfill the deeds and desires of the flesh. Now I'm not saying we'll never sin. I'm just saying we will not live in a lifestyle of satisfying the flesh. Now, too many Christians don't get this at all. They have in their minds because they've been taught by church after church after church, just believe in Jesus, pray this little sinner's prayer, and you're good. And after that, it doesn't really matter what you do. You can sin. You can do your you your own plans and purposes. You can do everything you want with your life. and you're still going to go to heaven. It's the biggest lie, bunch of lies that's ever been told because that is not what Jesus said. That is not what he preached. Being born again through faith is just the beginning. I mean, what would you think about a baby that was born that didn't grow, that didn't change, that didn't mature? it wouldn't be right. Something would be wrong. But this is what we have. We have a bunch of Christians say, "Well, I just be born and stay there." And this is why we have denominations. You know why we have denominations? Because we start a little bit here and we decide that's as far as we're going. And then another church comes along goes not as more here in this book we ought to be doing. And so they start doing that. So it's another denomination. And then that denomination stops at a certain point obeying the word of God and growing and maturing. And then we get another one. And then we get another one. This is why we have denominations because we got a bunch of people that just don't want to go all the way with Jesus. They want to put their hand to the plow and look back. That's why I've called this today no looking back.
- 0:18:00
No looking back. To me, this is we're going to read one of the most scary passages in the Bible in a second. Luke chapter 9. But again, he says, "As many as are led by the spirit of God, they are the sons of God." And I want to go to John 10 verse 27. I talk about this verse a lot because verse 28's a verse they use to teach you're once saved, always saved, no matter how you live. But again, is who's it applied to? And I'm going to get this in people if it takes me, you know, the until Jesus comes. I'm going to keep preaching this. But verse 27, Jesus made this statement. My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. And then there's a colon. Meaning this is thought is not finished. He says it's connected to the next thing. and I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. Those two verses are connected meaning there's a condition to having eternal life and not being plucked out of his hand. The condition is that you hear his voice and you follow him. And as I have said many times for the last 30 plus years, 40 years now it's going on 40 years that hear and follow present tense Greek verbs meaning ongoing continuous action taking place in the present. So someone who gets eternal life and cannot be plucked out of God's hand is someone who is continually hearing what the Lord is saying and they are following him in a continual habitual lifestyle. That's why he said in Romans 8:14 that those who are led by the spirit of God are the sons and daughters of God. Meaning, if you're led by the flesh, if you're led by your own mind and your own emotions, your own will, you are not a son or daughter of God, you are not going to have eternal life. And little deceivers and false teachers going to come along and they will pluck you right out of God's hand because you made the choice. God won't hold you there by force. Now
- 0:20:31
go to Luke chapter 9. And this is the passage the Lord gave me last night. And that's why you can put the title slide up why I entitled this No Looking Back. And we're going to look at what this means from this passage here. I remember reading this when I was 19 years old and it absolutely put the fear of God in me. And if this doesn't put the fear of God in you, something's wrong with you. You hear me? Something is terribly wrong. Now, let's go down to Oh, let's drop on down to where are we here? Yes. Down to verse 57. Now, we might back up and read something in this chapter that gives again more context to this, but it's pretty simple here because there's a lot of people in the world right now who say, "I follow Jesus or I'm going to follow Jesus or I want to follow Jesus or I am following Jesus." All kind of people claim that. And so verse 57, Luke 9:57, he says here, "And it came to pass that as they went in the way, a certain man said unto him, Lord, I will follow thee whethersoever thou goest." Sounds like somebody wants to be a Christian. Lord, I want to follow you wherever you wherever you go, wherever you lead me. You know what's sad is a lot of people start out that way when they're born again and then they cease being that way. But he goes on to say, Jesus said unto him, foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the son of man hath not where to lay his head. And he said unto another, follow me. But he said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. And Jesus said unto him, let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach the kingdom of God. And another also said,"Lord, I will follow thee, but let me first go bid them farewell which are at my house or at home at my house." And Jesus said unto him, "No man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God." Now, what's scary about these things right here is we wouldn't call these things sin. I let me go first bury my father. My father's oh, let me go, you know, take care of him until he dies and bury him and then I'll go follow you. Sounds reasonable. Oh, let me go first, Lord. Let me first go back to my house and tell everybody bye, farewell, and then I'll follow you. It sounds extreme. In fact, there would be people who would tell me if I preached that if it wasn't Jesus speaking this, "Pastor Dean, you're just hard. You're just you're just too mean and difficult. You're being unreasonable. Who would not let somebody go and bury their elderly father or take care of them till they die and bury them? Who wouldn't if they were going to leave and follow Jesus, go back to their home, say bye to everybody? But the Lord was making a point and several things he
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Read and search the complete transcriptInterpretations, personal accounts, historical assertions, and allegations are attributed to Pastor Dean Odle; inclusion does not indicate independent verification. October 11, 2026 is YouTube’s upload date, not an independently confirmed service date.