Monday, August 18, 2025

Who Are You Following?

Monday, August 18, 2025

 Just then someone came up and asked him, “Teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?” “Why do you ask me about what is good?” he said to him. “There is only one who is good. If you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.” “Which ones?” he asked him. Jesus answered: Do not murder; do not commit adultery; do not steal; do not bear false witness; honor your father and your mother; and love your neighbor as yourself.  “I have kept all these,” the young man told him. “What do I still lack?” “If you want to be perfect,” Jesus said to him, “go, sell your belongings and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” When the young man heard that, he went away grieving, because he had many possessions. Matthew 19:16-20

Pastor Jim is taking us through a series on what spiritual movement looks like as a disciple of Jesus and what the strategy is for making disciples at NSBC. At the center of the core values at North Side Baptist Church is holistic discipleship. As individual followers of Jesus and as a church, our call is to make disciples - one who has trusted Jesus by faith, is following and being transformed by Jesus, and is on mission for Jesus by leading others to do the same. The discipleship pipeline is a path where we as a church help lead every generation toward a fully-formed life with Jesus. A discipleship pathway is our personal path that moves us toward spiritual maturity. In order to grow towards spiritual maturity, we must move. Last week we learned that Trust is the first step on the discipleship pathway. As Christians, our belief in Jesus as the Son of God and our Savior is the foundation our life in Jesus is built on. As Pastor Jim said, “Trust is the oxygen of every relationship,” and without trust a relationship will die. 

The next step on the pipeline is Follow. Our foundation of trust in Jesus must be secure or we will not follow him. We are all following someone or something. Who or what we trust will determine who we follow and who we follow will determine how we are transformed. Trust is the beginning and the foundation, but it is an invitation to more. It is an invitation to be transformed. 

We often try to mold Jesus to look like us, to match our desires and join us where we want to be. As disciples of Jesus, we are supposed to be transformed to be like him, to learn to live and love like him, to step where the Spirit steps. Follow means that we surrender everything and join Jesus where he is working. We can do this because we trust him. 

For many, they will never find what they are looking for because they are looking in the wrong place. We will never find the right thing in the wrong place, but we will always find the wrong thing in the wrong place. The void we want filled, the hole in our heart we want patched, the loneliness we want to vanish, the loss we want erased – nothing on this earth will help any of this. The King of Kings is the only one who can give us what we want and need. The Rich Young Ruler had a life full of idols and still he knew something was missing. He felt the void. He was still seeking fulfillment. He did not like Jesus’ answer that he had to give up everything and follow him. But the cost of following Jesus is high. It costs us everything, but we gain everything in return. We must love him more than anything else in or lives so we must lay it all down and follow him. 

Does that mean you need to sell everything tomorrow? No but Jesus knew this man’s heart and he knew that this man loved his possessions more than he loved Jesus or wanted to follow him. We must get rid of anything or anyone that we love more than Jesus.  There is no room on the throne of our hearts for anything or anyone else.                                        

Are you following Jesus? Have you surrendered every part of your life to him?                     

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