John 6: 66From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
Jesus was a popular guy among the common people. When He showed up, people would flock to see Him, and many would follow Him when He left their town. They would follow….until it got hard. One thing that always strikes me is that it is never recorded that Jesus went after those who left Him. He was never heard to say, “hey guys, wait up….where are you going?” In doing so, Christ showed us one of the hardest examples we should follow. Learning to let people go. Christ knew that there would be many people who would not follow, He knew that there would be people who would come, listen, then leave. He never missed a beat, He never faltered. He just kept marching down His path set before Him by His Father. If only we could find a portion of that strength! How often do we clamor for the fellowship of people who really do nothing but drag us down? How often do we chase after people begging them to stay, yet knowing all the while that they do not really support us? We are taught to believe that the more people that we have with us, the stronger we are. We are told that it is better to keep the peace, and hold on to friends than it is to hold fast to the truth, and lose that relationship. It can be a painful lesson to learn, but one that we must all learn sooner or later. It is called “standing on the rock”. The rock is Jesus Christ. It is called living the truth, that truth is yet again Christ. It is about never standing alone, even when you find that you are standing by yourself. Your constant companion….anyone…anyone…yep, Jesus Christ. When we start living life on the rock, we will have people in our lives that will find it hard to continue to be our friends. We will have people that were close to us (or so we thought) judge us, and hold us out as traitors to the friendship. We cannot focus on what we lose, we have to learn to let them leave. It is not a matter of how many we lose, it is what we have to gain that counts. Christ knew what was on the line….eternal life for all. Christ knew who sent Him, and what was expected form Him. Armed with that knowledge Christ was unwavering. So we should be. We too know who sent us, we too know the expectations. SO we too must learn that while life on the rock can be challenging, it is the only life worth living, because it is the only life that is eternal. We will have people who will turn their backs on us, we will have people who turn their alliance on us. Let them go. I don’t know about you, but I would rather stand with the Trinity surrounding me, and stand alone on judgment day, than stand with a crowd of a thousand that never found the rock.
God Bless,
Brian Thetford
The New
<))))><
No comments:
Post a Comment