Teacher or Lord? | Restoring Warriors Daily Devotional | Matthew 26:24-25

Teacher or Lord? | Matthew 26:24–25 | The Difference Between Respect and Surrender

In Gospel of Matthew 26:24–25, Judas Iscariot sits at the same table as the other disciples. He listens to the teaching, follows the group, and stays close to Jesus Christ. But when he speaks, he calls Him “Rabbi”—Teacher—not Lord.

That one word reveals everything.

Judas was willing to learn from Jesus…
but not surrender to Him.

And many men live in that same tension today.

We respect Jesus.
We agree with His teaching.
We may even serve, lead, and show up consistently.

But when obedience becomes costly—when it demands sacrifice, humility, forgiveness, or change—we hold onto control.

Because there’s a difference between admiring Jesus and submitting to Him.

Calling Jesus “Lord” means more than believing in Him.
It means trusting Him enough to obey when the outcome feels uncertain.

The difference between spiritual growth and spiritual stagnation often comes down to one question:

Is Jesus just someone you listen to… or the One you follow?

Transcript

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We respect Jesus. We agree with his teachings. We agree that, hey, if I live my life, the way Jesus tells me to live my life. Welcome back. This is the Restoring Warriors Daily Devotional, where every day we challenge men to boldly pursue the gospel of Jesus Christ and become disciples in their homes and their communities. Hey, right now we're building out a powerful online community. It's called the Restored Kingdom Brotherhood. And if you go over to our website, restoring warriors.com and click on join a group, you can get all the information and join the Brotherhood from there. All right, let's dive back into it. We are in the book of Matthew, we're in chapter 26, verses 24 and funny, 25 says this the son of man will go just as it is written about him, but woe to the man who betrays the son of man. It would be better for him if he had not been born. Then Judas, the one who would betray him, said, Surely you don't mean me, Rabbi. All right, so Judas, he didn't deny Jesus, he didn't deny him, he didn't walk away early or anything like that. He actually stayed at the table. He stayed there, broke bread, he listened to the teaching, and then followed the group. All right, but but when he spoke to Jesus, the word he used was pretty peculiar. He said rabbi. He called him rabbi instead of Lord, right? Which means teacher. That one word, I think it reveals everything. Judas was willing to learn from Jesus, but he wasn't willing to surrender to Jesus. And I think that a lot of us live in that same type of tension today. We respect Jesus. We agree with his teachings. We agree that, hey, if I live my life, the way Jesus tells me to live my life, things are going to be a lot better. Man, men might even lead in a ministry or show up consistently to church and volunteer and do all those things. But when obedience becomes uncomfortable, when we have to give something up that we really like, when it requires sacrifice, when it requires humility or change, then we start to hold back control. We like to keep Jesus as an advisor instead of submitting to his full authority. And calling Jesus Lord, it means a lot more than just believing in him. It's trusting in him enough to obey, even when the cost is really high and the outcome is uncertain, when we don't know what our faith is going to lead to. The difference between spiritual growth and spiritual stagnation, oftentimes it comes down to one simple question. All right, is Jesus just somebody you listen to, or is Jesus somebody who you truly follow? All right, now pull out your journal. Let's take a couple minutes and let's let's use this question that I'm gonna ask and reflect. Invite the Holy Spirit into this process. All right, here's your question. Is there is there one area of your life where you know what Jesus is asking, but you're still holding on to control? And then uh a daily challenge for you is is to choose one specific area, probably whatever came up when you were doing your your uh reflection question. An area where you have delayed obedience or just flat out disobeyed. Use that one thing and take one concrete step today to submit it fully to the Lord. All right, let's pray. Father, Lord, I don't want to keep you as at a distance. I don't want to keep you as a teacher. I want to follow you as my Lord and my Savior, Jesus. Jesus, give me the courage to surrender control, to trust your direction, and to obey you without any hesitation. Jesus, it's in your glorious name we pray. Amen. Hey, thank you so much for tuning in today. If you were encouraged by this devotional, then I encourage you to send it off to a friend. Make sure you like, make sure you leave a comment, but make sure you hit the subscribe button because we drop these Monday through Friday, first thing in the morning. It's a great way to start off your day with an encouraging word. It's an absolute honor to ministry with you. Can't wait to see you on the next one.