If you are a Christ-follower then you understand that following after Him costs you everything.
There are many people today that find it important to abide by some religious standard – attend church, do good things, “add Jesus” to their already busy lives and try to make time for Him. And they call this Christianity or “following Christ”.
People regularly attend church all across the country and the world. We give to the poor. We do things in the name of God. What causes people to go to so much trouble to add a religious element to their lives if they do not intend to embrace the God of the Bible and the Way He made for us to know Him and walk with Him?
I frankly am burdened by the makeshift piety that fills our church congregations today. Hollow, joyless, lifeless. It literally steals from us.
I often wonder to myself why people go through so much trouble to incorporate an element of God into their lives instead of embracing God and His plan through the scriptures. Truly the choice is all of God or none of Him – Right? And the result is life or death to the soul. It was the start of my own journey…having my eyes opened to the Truth. For a long time I had been after an idea about Christ instead of the person of Christ. I hadn’t really decide to follow Jesus. In a sense I was asking Him to follow me.
But when we come to the place that we realize religious busyness is empty and fruitless, we begin to ask the more important questions.
Have you ever asked, (perhaps even in a moment of desperation), “God, what do you want from me?!”
Wanna know the answer? Everything. The cost of discipleship – following Christ – is all of you for all of Him.
The cost of discipleship – following Christ – is all of you for all of Him.
In Matthew 16:24 Christ says, If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
You and I – WE are “anyone”. Want to follow Christ? Then deny yourself, take up your cross and follow Him.
The danger we face is to neglect the important question. Am I truly following after Christ?
Our constant effort to do something “spiritual” like go to church or “love our neighbor: or “be a better person” all indicate a longing within us to know our Creator. A longing to worship. God made us that way – to long to worship and enjoy Him. But we often, because of the power of sin, we become distracted by other things that are simply lesser gods to which we offer our worship:
- Possessions
- Money
- People
- Status
- Leisure
- Self
Will you worship these above the God of the Universe? Will you seek these with more abandon than you will a personal daily relationship with Christ? Lesser gods don’t lead to lesser living. They lead to death.
Lesser gods don’t lead to lesser living. They lead to death.
Don’t be fooled.
21“Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. 22On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’ 23But I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.’ Matthew 7:21-23
People who sit in our churches day in and day out should know that the way of Christ is not what we’ve made it. Many will someday find this to be true with great sorrow in their hearts. It is not prosperity. It is not the pathway to all the things we want for ourselves. It is, in fact, death to the things we want. It is death to our plans and idols. It is death to us.
And it is life!
It is eternal life to us because of Jesus. It is abundant life now! I said earlier that we give all of us for all of Him. Friend, can I tell you that we cannot comprehend the fullness of God and his mercy and love and goodness towards us. He saved me – a sinner deserving punishment – and gave me a deep fulfilling life in Himself. I can’t think of a greater gift – all of me for all of Him. How humbling!
It’s the life we were created to live. The way of Jesus is peculiar, paradoxical, and powerful. It is life-giving, and self-sacrificing and suffering. It is truth, joy, peace and the deepest measure of love. It is FOR us and there is only one way to this life – through Jesus.
1 John 5:11-12 says, And this is what God has testified: He has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have God’s Son does not have life.
John 14:6 says, “Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me'”
Friends, we’ve got to stop. Either stop calling this religion we’ve made for ourselves “following Christ” or we must truly follow Him.
Don’t be fooled by any lesser thing.
