Gospel of Mark…”Follow Jesus…Immediately”

Gospel of Mark…”Follow Jesus…Immediately” by Randolph Jason for Gospel News Network

Following Jesus is as simple as setting down your “nets” (work) and following the Lord wherever He leads. Does that mean we must lay down our nets or does that sound like we need to change our heart, our minds and the way we conduct our lives?

“When Jesus invites people to follow Him, He ask them to follow Him, literally, to follow in His footsteps, to enter into a relationship with Himself.

In fact, that’s what Jesus is doing here. Jesus was a Rabbi, which meant that He was a teacher of the law. What a Rabbi would do is they would raise up followers for themselves and they would teach them how to follow God’s law in the way that they would live their life. So, this is an invitation to go do life together. To let their lives be patterned after Jesus’ life – and that’s what he offers them.” Source – Pastor Mike, The Gospel Church

This is a powerful service that I would encourage everyone to listen.

This message has cleared a lot confusion for me. I have taken the words, “lay down your nets and follow Jesus” literally at times and thought that I needed to somehow physically stop what I was doing and go on a walk-about and just travel around proclaiming the Gospel from city to city. Wandering kinda aimlessly around the country. Sounds crazy, I know, and I’m grateful this did not manifest as it would have destroyed a lot more than it would have ever created.

This is a throwback to my upbringing. We are told all our lives that “time heals all wounds“. This is a lie from the enemy. We simply develop better tools to deal with the wounds. When you are a young person, desperate for approval for someone, anyone, to tell you “you’re doing a great job and continue following that path” it becomes easy to fall into any trap laid before you. If the authority in your life rarely to never offers guidance or encouragement for your heart, for the joy of God to enter your life, the enemy is sure to step into a field ripe for the picking.

You may be asking what this has to do with following Jesus? Well, everything. Imagine if you rarely to never hear that you are my good and faithful son / daughter. Imagine you’re rarely taught how to follow an idea, a principal or teachings in way that are positive and fulfilling in your life? Is this not what Jesus teaches us? Follow the good path; immediately offer your hands to be the hands of Jesus to do the good works placed upon your heart by Him?

If we look around today what do we see? Young people everywhere that need encouragement, that need someone with a kind heart to provide a simple “that a boy” to let let them know they have value, their ideas matter and what is in their heart is of great value; not only to their life, but to the world. As Christians should we be seeking these young people and attempt to bring some of them back from an overdose or bring a young woman back from selling her body or save another runaway lost forever in a wilderness of pain?

Is this what Jesus is telling us when He says “follow Me…immediately“? Is this how we change our hearts and become more like Jesus when we show His children, our brothers and sisters in Christ, they matter? Is it really that simple?