Jun 30, 2022
What does it mean to put Jesus first or to follow Him? And how can we know that we're doing it right? Hi, I'm Mike Henry Sr. with Follower of One. Thanks for joining me again today on the Follower of One podcast. I hope in five minutes to answer that question, but it's a little challenging. It started the last couple of episodes, we've been talking about following Jesus. And yesterday we read Matthew 16:24. Today, I want to include Matthew 16:25 and talk a little bit about the difference between putting God first and following Jesus. "Then Jesus said to his disciples, if anyone just to come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." That's Matthew 16:24-25 from the New American Standard Bible, the 1995 iteration.
You have to qualify all this, which translations you're using anymore. It's getting a little complex. The point that I wanna make in today's passage is following Jesus is not just another thing that I do. My to-do list is booked, just like yours. We have a ton of things going on. Many of us have trouble saying no, and we overcommit, or we have too many things that are pulling on us and tugging on us. I hear people often talk about how they try and put God first and then their family second, and then their job third, and things like that. And I realize, and I believe this passage, Matthew 16:25, tells us that God isn't first, that God is all, and that then we organize everything based on what God says. "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."
I want God to be everything that I do when I go to work. That's because that's what God has for me to do today. When I serve my bosses or pray for my coworkers or pray for the people around me, it's because I wanna be better at following God and following Jesus and doing what He says. When I look at my to-do list today, I'm swamped. I have a ton of things that I have committed to do. Many of those commitments were made trying to run a ministry. I'm in the middle of this. But at the same time, I'm not consulting God as much as I feel like I probably should. I need to listen to Him more and I want to hear Him talk and I want to hear His direction and His guidance. I wanna find his ease and his peace.
I need to be quicker to say no or slower to say yes because I want to lose my life for His sake. And I have to figure out how to do that. "Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it." I keep constantly struggling with trying to do what I want my schedule, on my timeline, my issues, my goals, my ideals.
Today, I commit to you, and I'm trying to be as honest as I can, I want to turn that around. I want to give God more of my life. I want to say, what would you have me do in everything that I'm doing in the way that I record these podcasts? In the way that I interact with people around Follower of One? In the way that I do service for others or interact with people, the way I pay bills, everything about what's going on in my life. The way I interact with my family, it needs to be God driven.
And I believe that's what it means to lose my life for His sake. Today, let's lose our lives a little more for Jesus's sake, ask Him where He would have you do that, and ask Him to put you to work in the lives of the people that you interact with every day. Let's trust God more, and watch Him use us.
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Thanks very much.