Follow Me

by jeromeobrien

One of the last things that Jesus said personally to Peter was, “You must follow me”.

Being a follower of Jesus is not just a Twitter thing, but a personal decision and commitment. There are many ways in which we can put this commitment into practice:

• submitting to the authority of Christ as revealed in the Word of God and through the gift of His Spirit;
• by knowing more about Christ through the reading of the Scriptures; and
• by emulating Jesus in the things that He did.

One of the things that Jesus did was pray.

Here’s an  example: Jesus is doing His thing one day when some of John the Baptist’s disciples arrive with heavy news: “John has been executed in prison.”, they tell him. This is grave news and the manner in which John was dealt with is also very upsetting. Jesus is understandably distressed. All He wants to do is go away to a quiet place to be alone with God and speak to Him. So he gets into a boat and crosses to a solitary place on the other side of the Lake. Unfortunately, the people who have come to see Jesus (read – have come to be blessed by Him in healing and wisdom) have overheard where he is going. The message gets passed on from one to another …. Anyway, when Jesus gets to this supposedly quiet place, there is a large gathering of thirsty, hungry, needy and expectant people waiting for Him.

I would have run away, and possibly given them a piece of my mind (had I any to spare). The Scriptures record though, that Jesus took pity on them and healed their sick and tended to their needs. This went on for the rest of the day and towards the end of it, Jesus’ friends are telling Him to send the people away as there is no food for them here in this ‘desolate’ place. So Jesus says, “That’s alright. You feed them”. It is the turn of the disciples to want to run away. In the end though, the people are miraculously fed and all the leftovers gathered in.

The thing is this has been some day for Jesus: distressing news, no time to Himself and constant demands. I think we would have excused Him the need to spend time with God that day. Instead, He dismisses the crowd home, sends His followers back across the Lake, and then goes up into those now quiet hills and prays.

Are you too busy to spend time with your heavenly Father each day? Then you are too busy.

Do you not have time in the day to be quiet and centred on the presence of God? Then you need to do something about your time.

Is there such distressing news that you cannot go to your Father with it? It is the first thing, and the best thing, to do.