Great crowds followed Jesus, and he turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to me and does not sacrifice love for his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”

Here, the term “sacrifice” implies placing our family on the altar of God. It by no means implies abandonment or ceasing to love; on the contrary, we are entering into a strong commitment before the Lord to pray daily for them and to have them under our responsibility.

To achieve this, we must place God first in our lives. When this happens, we will see how everything begins to fall into place. Honoring the Lord and His Word will make us better children, spouses, parents, and siblings.

No one who morally abandons their family can claim to have God and Jesus as the foremost in their heart. This is an absurd distortion of the Lord’s call and further confuses those involved.

That’s why the Savior includes sacrificing our own life, with its stubbornness and misunderstanding of God’s plans.

All of this implies being a disciple of Jesus: Putting God first, being a good family member, and sacrificing our life for the sake of all.