As I am starting to get into Jesus' life and ministry in my devotional, one thing is blatantly obvious, people were willing to drop everything just to follow Jesus. In Luke, starting around chapter 5, we start to see Jesus' ministry really come to life. He starts to perform miracles of physical healing, demon expelling, and sin forgiving. Clearly the appropriate response is to drop everything and follow him. We see a woman have a demon expelled from her and immediately she begins to follow him. Some other miracles that we see in this area are: healing of a mass group of people, cleansing of a leper, healing of a paralytic, causing empty fishing nets to become so full they break, the raising of a widow's dead son, and the forging of sins (the Pharisees didn't like this because only God could forgive sins and they didn't believe that was who Jesus was). So, as we can see, Jesus performed some pretty amazing miracles while he was here and people responded with praise and began to follow him.
One story here that I find especially interesting is when Jesus calls Levi. Many many many people started following Jesus but this story of Levi starting to follow Jesus is set apart so I want to set it apart too. Levi is a tax collector and one day he was just minding his own business at his tax booth. Jesus walks up to him and merely says "Follow me". What's his response? Luke 5:28 "And leaving everything, he rose and followed him". I think this is just awe inspiring. Sure, Jesus' reputation probably preceded him, but that doesn't make Levi's response any less awesome. This tax collector, one of the most despised professions of the time due to a lot of corruption like stealing people's money, dropped everything he was doing to follow Jesus. Just like that. The way I take this is that there was no hesitation just complete dedication. Amazing, isn't it?
Now, imagine Jesus came knocking at your door, the door of a broken sinner, and said "Follow me". How would you respond? If you're anything like me, you hope that you would respond like Levi and leave everything and follow him. But let's pause there for a second and think. Hasn't Jesus already done this? No, I'm not saying he's actually physically knocked on your door and spoken to you but has he not knocked on the doors of our hearts? Has he not made his point clear that he was and is the Son of God and died to save us from our sin and brokenness? Maybe you're not like me and wouldn't like to respond to Jesus' command to follow him like Levi did. But, if you are with me and would want to respond like Levi did, why haven't you? Maybe you have, I'm not claiming to know your life but I feel like more of us have not responded like Levi did. What are you waiting for? What's holding you back? Maybe there is an idol standing in your way that you just don't want to give up. Maybe you like sitting on your own throne. Maybe you are just too lazy and unmotivated.
For myself, I often find myself in the third category there, simply unmotivated or too lazy to get up and follow Jesus. I'm not sure why or what motivates me to be so unmotivated but it's something that I struggle with it. When I sit down and think about it, it really is silly. This man, who was fully God and fully man, lived a sinless life only to die a brutal death on a cross for my sins. He endured our temptations, our trials, and our circumstances but was stronger than all of us and did not give in to sin. Isn't that amazing? That being true, why wouldn't we drop everything and follow him? What's holding us back? There is so much more that runs through my mind that I can't put to words but that is the gist of it. This was a bit of a longer post but I just had a lot to say on this I guess. I would encourage you to really consider this though and even read Luke 5 and maybe even Luke 6 and 7. Really think about your life and how you have responded to Jesus knocking on the door of your heart and asking you to follow him. Consider the questions that are throughout this post and pray about them and try to see ways in your life you could really commit your life to Jesus.
God Bless and Go Blue!
Tedd Sheets Jr.
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