Follow me...

"Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, "Where are you?"
~ Genesis 3:8 - 9

What was it about Jesus that could get a man to drop his empty fishing nets along the shoreline and to leave everything behind with two words, "Follow me?"  

One of the greatest identifiers of Jesus was his ability to touch people in a way that would make them want to begin again.  Fishermen, a tax collector, and others would leave everything behind them once they met Jesus.  

For me, it is the reality that it just wasn't humanity needing a Savior as much as it was also about God needing us.  Jesus is the One whom God sent so that we might have life, "more abundantly," but also, that we might have a new means to be in relationship with one another.  

Jesus is the reminder to us that God is not the Creator who simply created humanity and then looked on us from some lofty heavenly perch.  God is also not stationary, expecting all of us to come to God.  No, God leaves and comes to us so that we might suddenly realize the importance of the relationship.  God doesn't come to us with apologies or promises of change.  No, God sends Jesus to us, so that we can hear the words, "Follow me."

What we often overlook is that Jesus is the most radical effort God has undertaken so that we can be in relationship with God, pursuing after us, along beaches, crowded street corners, while walking a dusty road, drawing water from a well at midday, and when we stand and cry at the tomb of someone we love who has died.

It is when I begin to think of all the ways that God has pursued after me, just so that I can hear the words, "Follow me," that I realize the character of my spiritual journey.  Suddenly I realize that I am the one who has been hiding all the time.

Stay in God's grip!

G. Todd Williams (c) 2020