What Jesus Demands from the World
Stan and Trish sent us a wonderful book for Christmas...What Jesus Demands from the World by John Piper. The chapter that Jim and I read together this morning was "Take up your cross and follow me." Several points really struck me today:
Following Jesus means joining Him in what He was sent to do. Per Piper, "He came to gather a people -- specifically, to gather a people in allegiance to himself for the glory of his Father -- by dying to save them from their sins and to give them eternal life and a new ethic of love like his (John 13:34-35). Therefore, when he demands that we follow him, he means that we join him in that task of gathering: 'Whoever does not gather with me scatters' (Luke 11:23). There are no neutral followers; we either scatter or gather."
Whoa. No neutral followers. If we're not gathering...then we're scattering. Certainly caused ME to think about what I'm doing...or NOT doing.
Another challenge this morning came from the section subtitled "Suffering for Jesus with joy shows His supreme value." Piper writes: "He did not die to make this life easy for us or prosperous. He died to remove every obstacle to our everlasting joy in making much of him. And he calls us to follow him in his sufferings because this life of joyful suffering for Jesus' sake (Matt. 5:12) shows that he is more valuable than all the earthly rewards that the world lives for (Matt. 13:44; 6:19-20). If you follow Jesus only because he makes life easy now, it will look to the world as though you really love what they love, and Jesus just happens to provide it for you. But if you suffer with Jesus in the pathway of love because he is your supreme treasure, then it will be apparent to the world that your heart is set on a different fortune than theirs. This is why Jesus demands that we deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow him.
"Of course, the pain is temporary. He does not call us to eternal suffering. That's what he rescues us from."
One of the more beautiful things that we witness here in Ukraine are elderly folks who have lived through hell in many ways -- experiencing more evil in their lives than I can even imagine -- but now, as Believers, will sit in their small dark flats with only minimal personal belongings, look around at a few pictures of friends or family, clutch tightly their Bible, and proclaim that they have EVERYTHING that they need. They get it!
Oh that I might understand more fully what Jesus meant when He said to take up my cross and follow Him.
