As I was sitting in my office Tuesday, thinking about today’s message, which I have titled, “Why do we follow Christ?” a song came on the radio by Chris Tomlin by the name of “I Will Follow.”
I thought, thanks God for that conformation!
The words of the song are very powerful.
Where you go, I'll go Where you stay, I'll stay
When you move, I'll move I will follow...
All your ways are good All your ways are sure
I will trust in you alone Higher than my side
High above my life I will trust in you alone
Where you go, I'll go. Where you stay, I'll stay.
When you move, I'll move. I will follow you.
Who you love, I'll love. How you serve I'll serve.
If this life I lose, I will follow you I will follow you.
Light unto the world Light unto my life
I will live for you alone You're the one I seek
Knowing I will find All I need in you alone, in you alone
In you there's life everlasting In you there's freedom for my soul In you there joy, unending joy and I will follow.
This is an interesting question for us to ponder. The question, what draws us to Christ and why do we follow Him?
We will get back to that song in a minute or two.
Please take your Bible’s in hand and repeat this prayer with me.
Father,
Open my eyes so I can see Your truth.
Open my ears so I can hear Your voice.
Open my minds so I can understand your Word.
And, open my heart so I may receive all that You would have me receive.
AMEN
All of us here today are either already following Jesus or we are seeking and searching and deciding to follow Him.
Following Jesus is a day-by-day journey, which includes relying on Him to lead the way. At times, following Jesus can be a difficult thing to do. There are a plethora of things in our world that are trying to compete for our attention and loyalty. Many of which are easier to do.
I have always said that it takes a stronger man or woman to follow Christ than it does to not follow Christ. Following Christ means that you are living for something bigger than yourself. It means that we have to watch what we do and what we say.
What does it mean to follow Christ?
There are three key elements to following Christ.
1. You need to have a desire to follow Him.
READ Matthew 4:24-25
24 News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed; and he healed them. 25 Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan followed him. Matthew 4:24-25
The Bible says that large crowds followed Jesus. They had a desire to do so.
Some desired to follow Jesus because of all the miracles that He was performing.
Their desire was based upon the excitement of what was happening and their desire was based upon what they might get from Him. Maybe Jesus would heal them or bless them or turn their water into wine or multiply their fish and bread.
They were following Jesus for the wrong reasons.
Some followed Jesus out of curiosity. They heard the stories about Jesus from others and they wanted to see for themselves what was going on. They did not follow Jesus because they wanted to commit themselves to Him but rather they followed to satisfy their curiosity.
Some followed Jesus because they hated Him. Most of the people who hated Jesus were the Pharisees and Sadducees. They wanted to end His life and shut Him up.
They didn’t care what He was saying or what He was doing. To them His message was trouble and they could not accept it. They listened and took notes only because their desire was to destroy Him.
But there were some others who followed Jesus and they did so for the right reason.
They heard what He had to say. They witnessed what He was able to do and they were drawn to Him. They wanted to get to know Him better. They wanted to be friends with Him. They wanted Him to be a part of their life and they wanted to be a part of His.
The followed Him because they loved Him.
Even after they heard what it would cost them to follow, they still wanted to follow.
Jesus told them what it would cost them, 34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. Mark 8:34
Their desire was to follow Christ. Hopefully it is your desire as well.
2. The second element in following Jesus is to have faith in Jesus and in who He is.
Once your desire established then you need to adjust your faith.
You have to determine in your own mind that Jesus is the Son of God, the Savior of the World, the One who washes away our sins, The Healer, the Beginning and the End, the Alpha and Omega, The Lion of Judah, the Lamb of God.
You have to believe, even though others don’t believe you have to trust that the Word of God is true and the Jesus is who He says He is.
3. And then finally, the third element is that you accept the offer of eternal life that Jesus freely offers all who believe.
There comes a time in everyone’s life when they have to make a very personal and individual decision. It is a choice that every human is offered. It is the choice to follow Christ or not to follow Christ and to follow Him because He loves us and we love Him.
It is a decision to follow Christ not because He can heal me or bless me or provide for me. It is to follow Jesus because you love Him because He first loved you and gave Himself for you.
He paid a price that you could not afford to pay. He died on the cross for your sins. He was pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our sins.
Forget all the other blessings that come from following Christ and remember that the punishment that brings us peace was upon Him when He went to the cross.
With that in mind I want to know what drew you to Christ?
I want to know some details. Why did you decide to become a Christian? What was it that put you over the top and made you decide to follow Him? And then I want to know, why do you continue to follow Him?
Give time for plenty of people to respond.
Back to the Chris Tomlin song; Where you go, I'll go. Where you stay, I'll stay. When you move, I'll move. I will follow you.
Who you love, I'll love. How you serve I'll serve.
If this life I lose, I will follow you I will follow you.
Do we really understand the implications of what this song is saying? Are these words a true expression of our hearts?
Jesus’ main man, Peter had to deal with this same issue.
He was the brash disciple, he was the impulsive one; he was the one who made the big, bold statements. One of those statements that he made was to Jesus when Peter said, “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you.”
READ Mark 8:31-34
31 He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. 32 He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.
33 But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”
The Way of the Cross
34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
Mark 8:31-34
Jesus knew that path that He had to walk and He did so in faithful obedience. And He did not hide this path from His followers. He was very open and honest with them about His death and resurrection.
Even so, it must have come as a surprise to His followers as He was explaining this plan to them. They probably already had set their minds on a different version of how this was all going to play out.
They had probably envisioned Jesus and the 12 disciples all armed with swords in their hands, leading the armies of Israel against the Romans so that they could drive them out of Jerusalem and restore the nation to what it was suppose to be.
The idea of Jesus suffering and dying was not their plan and most likely not even in their thoughts.
What Jesus was sharing with them was dashing their dreams so Peter pulls Jesus to the side and begins to rebuke Him for saying such things. Peter did not have in mind what God had in mind.
How many times have you ever found yourself in that same position? Feeling disappointed or angry or scared because God’s plans turned out to be different than your plans.
Eventually Peter had to do what everyone else does who makes a decision to follow Christ has to do. He had to lay down his own ambitions and embrace what it truly meant to follow Christ.
At the end of Peter’s life, Peter allowed himself to be nailed to a cross, but before that time, Peter had to understand what it meant to be a follower of Jesus. This was a lesson that Peter had to learn early after His Mark chapter 8 experience.
It was a lesson that meant not seeking his own agenda and dreams fulfilled. Those things had to be crucified early in his life and surrendered to God’s greater purpose.
And that is still what it means to be a follower of Jesus today.
It means that we lay down our own agendas and hopes and dreams, and to be faithfully obedient to God.
It is daily dying to our own petty and self-centered desires so that we might more clearly reflect Christ to the people around us.
This is extremely important because in the end, that is what is going to draw them to Christ.
When others see the simple, ongoing obedience to the words of our Lord in our lives it will draw them to Christ.
Why do we follow Christ?
Jesus said, “Follow me…”
As the church we are supposed to be the body of Christ in the world. That means that as Jesus’ followers we are to be His hands and feet to others.
Somehow the church has done a great job of making believers, but a horrible job of making followers of Jesus. We do a great job being Jesus’ mouth, but a poor job of being his hands and feet.
Being a believer is easy. Being a follower is hard.
The reason being a follower is hard is because Jesus didn’t call me to a life of just going to church. He called us to a life of righteousness and holiness and a life of adventure by being his hands and feet to other people.
When we accept this adventure, then we are being a follower of Jesus. And then we can feel most fulfilled in our faith.
Our job as followers of Christ is to draw people to Jesus so they will be followers of Christ.
If we lose the next generation of people to the enemy then it won’t be because we didn’t entertain them enough in the church, it will be because we didn’t dare them with the gospel and the adventure that’s involved in following Christ.
When Jesus said, “follow me,” he was saying “watch me,” and “see me.” He was telling people to see how he lived and do it the same way.
What do people see today if they watch Christians closely? Do they see followers of Jesus or just believers?
When it comes to Christianity, maybe even more important than what you believe and how you believe, and how you live.
We need to long for a Christianity that looks more like Jesus.
Church we need to follow Christ.
Are you a follower of Christ?
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