My good friend Johhny Friesner wrote this for one of the devotionals at LCC recently. Hope it challenges you like it did me!
I have always wanted to go on a cruise. Every time I see a commercial for a cruise, it makes think of how nice it would be to be on one of those boats. To have a care-free time where you get to just spend the day however you want. Doesn’t that just sound nice right about now.
Sometimes I think we feel that we have signed up for a cruise when we decided to follow Jesus. That if we follow Jesus, everything will be care-free; no financial problems, the addictions would go away, your marriage would improve, life would just be better. Maybe you heard that, that if you accepted Jesus you could have “Your Best Life Now”.
I was discussing this with my friend Chris and he said it like this, “It is like we walked on to a war ship thinking it was a cruise”. When I read the Bible and look at the lives of those who followed Jesus wholeheartedly, it doesn’t seem anything like a cruise. There’s a war at hand. You have signed up to fight. Just read some of these scriptures:
2 Timothy 3:12,13; 1 Peter 4:12-19; John 15:18-21; Ephesians 6:10-20 And the list can go on and on.
To be honest, my life doesn’t match up to this. I am way too concerned about myself and my avoidance of discomfort, of persecution, of what other people might think. I believe sometimes that Jesus is here to make much of me. I want him to be the Messiah of all my problems. How foolish is that thinking. You see it’s not about me. It’s all about Jesus. I was created to make much of Him and to treasure Him above all things no matter the cost. The question I keep coming back to is this: Is Jesus enough? Is Jesus the ultimate prize or am I following him to get something out of him; Jesus + something else. This is what I am asking you. Are you wanting God on your terms? For him to make much of you? Or is Jesus enough?
“The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs-heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” Romans 8:16,17 (ESV)
