DAY 1: I HAVE DECIDED TO FOLLOW JESUS

I want to take you back to the first day you met the real Jesus. The relief you felt when you realized you could be set free from that addiction, you could be made brand new, and receive a fresh start. The moment you heard the words of Jesus saying, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavily burdened [by religious rituals that provide no peace], and I will give you rest

(Matthew 11:28-30).”

Can you remember the moment that you realized you were in need of a savior? Can you remember the awareness of the void that sat inside the core of your being and how the Holy Spirit revealed to you that the only person that could fill that void was Jesus?? Remember the passion that came out of this experience. The new fire you never knew you could have for this thing called “the Gospel”. You had to tell everybody about it! It took you over and immediately started changing you from the inside out. You truly did become “born again”. Perhaps even the closest people around began to say things like, “you’ve changed” or they asked questions like “what’s gotten into you!?”.

The closest comparison you might use to describe this experience to somebody that’s never been born again is probably the feelings and changes that happen when somebody has fallen in love. It takes over their thoughts, they walk around with that silly little smile, and they wanna spend all their time with that person! Funny enough, for everybody close to them that’s never met this other person they sorta have the tendency to either get annoyed or flat out curious if this person their friend or family has fallen in love with actually “lives up to the hype”.

There really are many similarities with our walk with Jesus. Once you profess this new relationship (as you should), people begin to take notice and ask questions. Yes, some folks even begin to get annoyed at your love for Jesus. Perhaps many of them have had a bad experience with someone else who professed a relationship with Jesus and it’s caused a bad taste towards the things of God. Nonetheless, they’re watching and they are taking notice to see if this change you’ve talked about is truly at work. I don’t bring this up in a way that would suggest a “pressure” or sense of “minding your p’s and q’s”. No, I bring it up to let you know that those friends or family members that may not have received your relationship with Jesus with the level of excitement and open heart that you’d hoped are indeed still watching and God is using you in ways you might not have even considered just by the testimony of your life. You are a living breathing testimony to people you come in contact with of the goodness of God.

It’s important to always remember that the decision to follow Jesus wasn’t ever about being “better” than somebody else. It wasn’t about pretentiously saying “ha! Now I’m forgiven and you’re not, you sinner”. No. It’s simply about getting to know who God is through the lenses of His son Jesus and His Holy Spirit and how that enables to love God and to love people more than we ever could in our own strength. This decision to follow Jesus was about recognizing that we’re flawed individuals and can never measure up to God’s standard of holiness in our own strength and our own righteousness. So we decided to receive His. We decided to come to the end of ourselves, put our faith in the finished works of the cross that Jesus completed on our behalf, and let Him become the governor of our lives. This decision was the admission that we are no good at being in charge of our own lives & so we are letting go of the reins and the control and asking the new Lord of our lives to order our steps as we surrender our hearts to Him.

This is the process of coming back to our first love (Revelation 2:4). Somewhere down the line, I think we get so comfortable and dare I say “professional” at being “Christians” that we forget the need for intimacy with the Father. To be blunt, we forget our need for a savior. Yes, I said it. I see it all too often. You get saved, you get really sure of yourself and your ability to “walk a straight line”. You get to know a bit about your foundations: The Trinity, Jonah and the Whale, Adam and Eve, Father Abraham, the thief on the cross, and all these wonderful things that you could teach to a Sunday school class when called upon… But somewhere down the line, if we’re not careful we just become religious, self-righteous, and performance driven. We start patting ourselves on the back as if the Holy Spirit hasn’t been the one helping us along all this time. As a result, we extend less grace to others and miss the mark entirely. This same mentality eventually can spiral into pridefully thinking that we’ve “heard it all” already. We start to block out space for the Holy Spirit to give us new revelation and we’re only comfortable with getting “reminders” - and if anybody dares to say anything in a fresh way, we dismiss them, even if they are in line with the Word of God. There are so many dangers in this. First of all, faith never came by having heard. Romans 10:17 says that “faith comes by hearing and hearing and hearing the Word of God”. That means we have to stay teachable and have ears to hear what the Spirit is saying. This is part of an active healthy walk with Jesus. If we’re not careful we get pious, we get haughty, we become like the Pharisees; so full of information that there’s no room for revelation. This is not a good recipe for an ongoing walk with Jesus. So, we must CONTINUE in the truth and never grow stagnant in our walks.

You see, the decision to follow Jesus is not a one time decision. It’s a daily decision of surrender and dying to SELF (denying the cravings and desires of our 5 physical senses to govern our lives). It’s signing up as a lifetime student at the University of the Word & the Spirit where you position yourself to keep on hearing and hearing and hearing by the Word of God (Romans 10:17). It’s keeping a meek (teachable) spirit until the day we die or Jesus comes back (Matthew 5:5). It’s never outgrowing a life of servitude (Matthew 20:28). It means never being too proud to say I’m sorry or too stubborn or bullheaded to say “I love you, I forgive you, and I’m asking you to forgive me,” before the sun goes down (Ephesians 4:26-27). This walk with Jesus is an eternal decision. A decision that nobody should be able to talk you into or out of… And should we never ever forget, this walk with Jesus that brings us this new spirit of righteousness (right standing with God - 2 Corinthians 5:17-21) is a GIFT that we COULD’VE NEVER EARNED. So, all boasting in our own goodness isn’t allowed or merited (Ephesians 2:8-9).

Prayer

Father, I thank you for the gift of salvation through the shed blood of Jesus. I recognize my need for you. I admit today and everyday, I still need you. I need the blood of Jesus. I need the wisdom of the Holy Spirit and your presence in my life. I refuse to do it on my own. I repent for the times that I’ve taken the reins of my life. I surrender my life to you today and everyday. You are my first love and I will not forget it or put anybody or anything above you. I have decided to follow Jesus, I will never turn back. In Jesus name I pray and believe, Amen.