Follow Me

No, I'm not trying to convince you to follow my blog. That would be lame and a little desperate, and I'd like to think that I'm neither of those. At least not that I'm aware of.

I'm pondering over the words that Jesus spoke to the men who would become his apostles. "Follow Me."

I am a fairly skeptical person by nature. And I wonder, if Jesus, a perfect stranger (appropriate considering His perfection), came up to me today and said, "Follow Me," how would I respond?

I think my first instinct would be to say: "Why?" And then, assuming I was actually willing to follow, my next question would be: "Where are we going?" I might not say it, but the thought would be running through my head: "And what happens if I don't follow You?"

But, amazingly, we don't get those responses from the fishermen and tax collectors who received - and forthwith answered - Jesus' call to follow. Instead, this was their response: "At once they left their nets and followed Him." When Jesus saw Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth and uttered those two words - "Follow Me" - the verse says that "Matthew got up and followed Him." No questions, no what-if's, he just got up and followed Him.

Sadly, this was not always the case when Jesus beckoned people to follow Him. There was the rich young man who boasted about keeping all the commandments, yet still lacked something in his life. Jesus told the man, "If you want to be perfect [spiritually mature], go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow Me.” So, of course, the man did as Jesus said, right? Not exactly. The verse continues: "When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth."

I wonder if, instead of being like the disciples, I would be like that rich young man. Would I be unwilling to give away all that I had - both in riches and reputation - to follow a Man I didn't know, who didn't tell me why He wanted me to follow Him, and wouldn't tell me where I was going? Would you?


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Matthew 16:24
"Then Jesus said to His disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me."

Double Standards

Many people set ridiculously high standards for their fellow man (or woman, or child). They expect others to be exactly what they want them to be; and when (inevitably) others do not live up to that standard, they are rebuked, rebuffed, or in some cases, removed. Whether or not these same people set for themselves the same standards, or whether they live up to their own expectations of themselves is, for the sake of this discussion, irrelevant.

Here's what is relevant. And that's God's standard. Whoa, whoa, God's standard? Isn't that PERFECTION? Yes, it is. And there can be no exceptions to the rule. It's either perfection or destruction. Well, where's the hope in that?

Here's the thing. God expects absolute perfection, yet He expects it from imperfect creatures. How do you reconcile the two? That reconciliation only comes in the person of the God-Man, Jesus Christ. Jesus bridged the gap between God's perfection and our imperfection through the blood He shed on the cross. Without that, we have no hope. We have no means, in and of ourselves, of achieving God's standard of perfection. But, with Jesus interceding for us, the gap between us and God not only narrows, it closes.

Given the choice between the two – utter hopelessness and everlasting hope – I'll stick with the latter. What about you?

Dizzy Does It

A few weekends ago, for reasons beyond my limited medical comprehension, I had a bout with dizziness. Eventually, I prevailed over dizziness, because, I believe, I was in better shape (imagine that!) and had trained harder. But nevertheless, it was quite a fight, lasting several rounds. There are few things, in my mind, that can compare with the helpless feeling of being dizzy. Being drunk maybe, but I wouldn't know that firsthand, since I've never even taken a sip of anything that could make me drunk. Being on strong medications, or not-quite-legal pharmaceuticals, but I wouldn't really know about those either. I wouldn't necessarily call being dizzy an altogether unpleasant sensation, though when I nearly fell down in a crowded restaurant, that was a little disconcerting. It's just a strange feeling to lose control. I think that I, like a lot of people, put a lot of value in being able to control a situation, the outcome of events, or – in my baser moments – even another person. To lose that ability, even for a short time, is humbling. It engenders dependency: on others, on "whatever will be will be", or, if you will, on God. When my hands are tied, or more metaphorically accurately, when I can barely take a step on my own, it's then that I realize that I'm not in control. I never am. It's that ever-present illusion of self-reliance that dies in those moments. And I think that's probably a good thing.

Leaving On A Jet Plane, Didn't Know I'd Come Right Back Again

Yesterday I spent approximately four-and-a-half hours in airports and another six hours or so actually in the air flying. At the end of the day I ended up right back where I started. I never reached my destination. If I were author Max Lucado or some other great storyteller, I'd probably be able to come up with a clever correlation about how this is a good picture of the way we live our lives. Going around in circles, never getting anywhere. But I'm not that clever. Also, I have a headache, which significantly hampers creative thought. So I leave it to you to draw your own conclusions. Get back to me on that. I'll be waiting. I mean, I'm not going to drop everything and wait for your replies, but, you know, I'll check back every now and then to see if anyone has posted a good response. If I think about it... Better write myself a reminder note.