Is Your Life Worth Following?
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Is following Jesus worth it? Is He?
Let your life answer that question.
Does your life whisper yes? Does it scream yes? Does it say yes at all?
Are we living out our relationship with Jesus in a way that people see Him? In a way that people look at our lives and see Jesus and only Jesus?
Do people see a glimpse of his beauty and power when they see you? Do they see you following Him?
Are we, as believers, living lives worth following? Are you?
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My soul is troubled and my Spirit has been downcast over the past few weeks. I look around and I see so many people who are lost and whose souls are crying out for help. One of my prayers over this summer and still presently has been for the LORD to make me full of compassion.
I desire a heart like Christ. I want to rejoice in what brings God joy, and I want to mourn over what makes Him mourn. Truly in the modern day this is a radical way of living. With so many people far from God, and with this heart posture, O how often we should be mournful! People do not know what perfect love feels like, they don’t know what fullness of joy feels like, they don’t know what the protection and provision of God feels like. People not in Christ don’t know what it's like to abide in perfection.
Genesis 1:27 says that “God created man in his own image”, which makes us the pinnacle of God’s creation. He didn’t make animals or mountains or lakes out of His image, just us. This does not mean we are part God, or that we are little versions of God. That is little God’s doctrine, and is an erroneous interpretation of Scripture.
Being the pinnacle of God’s creation means we are the only living beings to have the potential and capacity through a saving relationship with Jesus Christ to know God. To know the God of the universe. We are the only aspect of creation that gets this opportunity.
God has communicable and incommunicable attributes to His character. Incommunicable attributes are the characteristics of God that He alone possesses (like the Omni’s). Communicable attributes are one’s that God possesses in full and in perfection, but that we get to share in.
We get to share in love, joy, faithfulness, kindness, patience, etc. We get to love one another, experience joy with one another, exhibit faithfulness to one another, be kind to one another, be patient with one another, and so forth.
Our God:
- Portrays love in fullness and perfection.
- Provides joy in fullness and perfection.
- Exhibits faithfulness, kindness, patience, mercy, grace in fullness and perfection.
He is perfect! Paul says in his letter to Ephesus that he prays for them to be given the Spirit of wisdom and revelation to understand the power they have in Christ, to be able to somewhat grasp the magnitude of the hope they have; the same one we do.
For the lovebirds out there who have a list of everything they want in a man or woman, how about someone who exhibits every characteristic to PERFECTION. To PERFECTION.
Who wouldn't want to date perfection? Who wouldn’t want to marry perfection? Is following perfection worth it?
The answer to all of these is an obvious yes. But how many of us, as believers, actually live like we get to experience perfection? That we get to receive the communicable attributes of God in full?
To clarify, we are the sons and daughters of God, and we’re not actually dating Him. But I think the structure of romantic relationships on earth is a great representation of what our relationship with God should be like.
It should be intimate. It should be prioritized.
Ephesians 5 calls us as the church the bride of Christ. Being Christ’s bride, we should probably be attracted to Him. We should want to spend time with Him. Psalm 1 talks about how the blessed meditate on God’s law day and night. In other words, just like a married couple, we should wake up with Jesus and go to bed with Him. We should be doing this!
I’ve been made fun of before for calling my quiet times “date’s with Jesus’, (DWJ) but that is what they are! I want to know my God more and grow in intimacy with him, and I like calling my quiet times “dates” because it reminds me of the purpose behind why I do it. I’m intentionally spending time with someone seeking to know them more. I want to know God more. We should be in active pursuit of a perfect, unchanging God seeking to know Him more. And when we draw close to God, in James 4:8, He draws nearer to us.
How can we expect someone to pursue a relationship with Jesus if we aren’t actively pursuing it ourselves? How can we expect someone to want that when we don’t want it ourselves? Are you living in a way that evidently produces the aroma of Christ?
Just like an engaged woman flexes her engagement ring everywhere she goes, we should be flexing our relationship with Jesus everywhere we go. I’m not saying you need to tell everyone you meet everywhere, although I’m not saying you shouldn’t, but I am saying that your relationship and connection to Jesus should be evident to everyone you interact with!
What are you flexing? Do people look at your life and see a Jesus follower or do they see your work? Do they see your achievements? What do people see when they see you?
In Colossians 3:4, Paul talks about Christ being our lives. Is He your life? Does He dominate your day to day? Is your life lived vicariously, completely through Him? Is your life completely His?
Many of you listening right now are actually dating Jesus. You go on a date once a week on Sunday morning and that's it. You hang out once a week. But that is not what we’re called to do. God wants us to choose Him each and every day. We are His bride. You need to decide whether you’re going to marry Jesus or not. To ask that literally, Are you going to be all in with Jesus or not?
I believe a reason for the growing number of people not following Jesus is because of the growing number of believers who don’t live like they believe. I don’t believe we make Christ look attractive at all.
Christianity is SO APPEALING. Relationship with God is the most attractive thing ever. There is nothing more attractive than a relationship with God. Because it is perfect. You are seen perfectly, loved perfectly, literally every aspect in full.
Despite this, many non-believer’s look at Christianity and find it unattractive. None of that has to do with God. It has everything to do with the individual person and also the people around them.
If we lived out the sermon on the mount, if we lived the way Jesus calls us to in Matthew 5-7, how much different this world would look! If we lived in confidence of our God knowing He can do anything, O how much different this world would look!
I’ve put myself in the shoes of unbelievers here recently. If I were a frat guy who didn’t know Jesus at UNC, I would not see the appeal. What is so different? ‘I seem to be doing just as fine as Christians, with the only differences being we don’t drink or smoke’. HOW STUPID!
Abstinence from drinking and smoking are not the only differences in the lives of believers and non-believers. Yet that seems to be all that is noticed.. Isn’t that interesting? No wonder many people view the Bible as a set of rules to follow, because all they see is what we choose not to do!
There is a radical difference in joy and love that should come from Jesus. There is a radical difference in the community. The Acts 2:42-47 community; the one that shares everything with each other, prays with each other, worships with each other, has everything in common because Christ is their life. Do non-believers see a radical difference between their community and yours?
I can’t control the decisions others make. Some may choose to worship themselves over God, even after seeing His goodness in your life. We can’t control anything about their decisions.
However, I don’t believe we as believers are living out our relationship with God in a way that seems appealing to non-believers.
You may be the only Bible a non-believer reads. By following you, many don’t realize they are following Jesus. But are you living a life worth following? Would someone look at your life, and the fruit of it, and come away saying ‘I want what she has.’ or ‘I want what he has’? More effectively, would someone look at your life and recognize divine power or intervention? Would they smell the aroma of Jesus by being around you?
Really reflect on that.
Are we living our lives in a way that causes the need for tremendous experiences of God?
Are we living for God in a way that has great cost?
Are we giving God opportunities to reveal himself to us in massive ways? Ways that may seem impossible to us?
Are we praying for miracles? Are we praying to see His goodness? Is our prayer life bold or shallow?
I want people to see Christ when they see my life. I want people to look at the circumstances of my life and chuck it up to crazy coincidence or divine intervention. Like I said last Wednesday, I want to feel as if my life has popped out of the Bible.
I’ve asked myself all of these questions that I’ve just asked you and my honest answers have been humbling. Do people really see Jesus when they look at my life? The answer has been a sad no sometimes. It is easy to live conformed to the spiritual deadness of the world we live in. But I do not want to live that way. I don’t want to live a life of safety. That is not what I’m called to do.
What about the gospel is safe?
What about it is not radical in the eyes of the world?
Again, would a non-believer look at your life and see Jesus? Would they want what you have?
Looking in the mirror, what can you personally do, or what can you pray for God to change in your heart, that would allow for people to see Jesus and only Jesus when they look at you? Surrender control. Be all in, and live to see God’s goodness and his beauty.
David says in Psalm 27 that his one desire was to see the beauty of God and dwell with him all his days. If we live with that desire, to see God and his beauty, and just that, our lives would look so different. There is nothing more beautiful than God, and if we are following that, people around us will want to follow as well.
People are attracted to beauty, and there is nothing more attractive than the beauty of our God. Let us live in pursuit of that beauty, so that others might do the same.
Go tell someone about Jesus.
I love you guys.
God bless.