Follow me

As they were walking along the road, a man said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” He said to another man, “Follow me.” But he replied, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Still another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say goodbye to my family.” Jesus replied, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:57-62 NIV)

As we read Luke chapter 9, we can see that it is a very busy chapter. Jesus multiplies the bread for the crowd, heals the sick, is transfigured at the mountain before three of his disciples, goes to Jerusalem; He is not accepted in a samaritan village and He has to go to another village, and at the end, while He is going there, he talks to these three people that the scripture tells us about.

There are several possible ways that we can relate to Jesus, and in all of them we know He does good for us: He blesses us, He feeds us, He comforts us, He heals us. From all these manifestations of Jesus's authority, among all the miracles, there is one manifestation that is more subtle, maybe less impressive, less virtuous, but that is the one that have my attention due to the impact it has in our lives.

It is Jesus calling: "follow me". How simple is to comprehend a miracle, a manifestation of power, glory, and divine healing. These are, in fact, glorious moments that leave a mark in the history of those who are present, of those who received a favor from God. The calling "follow me", however, is something of much greater deepness, much greater transcendence, and whose responsive action is not something tight, immediate, unique. But to respond this calling make us to question the very essence of who we are, which values we have, what is important to us and what is the priority of our hearts.

"Follow me". Such a simple expression that leads us to the most profound reflection. A simple calling with the power to hit our spirit and soul in a way we could never think possible. So much at stake! So many questions! It is Jesus calling us to something higher, something precious, something inscrutable. Moreover, it touches the subjects that most afflicts us: it is something we do not know, something that we are afraid of, something that challenges us to see beyound the limits of our own individuality.

The social and moral degradation we have seen around us, if you and I just stop to think about, comes from the fact that more and more the individualism is being aimed and preached, and each time there are less limits for what someone could desire and achieve. However these things stick us to a meaningless life, that could follow its way towards the grave without knowing a thing but itself, its wishes, its selfishness.

"Follow me", said Jesus. Jesus invites us to abandon our own way and follow His way; or better, the way which is Himself. He invites us to stop deciding where we would go, where we would eat, where we would sleep, what are our dreams and ambitions, in order to live and walk whatever He lives and walks. Such a simple expression, but like a two-edged sword, it crosses the human soul, taking us to the most profound questions.

How would I respond? How would you respond? Are we able of leaving aside the emptyness of our own priorities in life? Are we able to see how much meaningless our own search becomes when we live circling around ourselves? Are we able to respond to this call?

"Follow me", Jesus says to us today.

Martha, Mary and Lazarus

"When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died."
When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled.
"Where have you laid him?" he asked. "Come and see, Lord," they replied.
Jesus wept. "
João 11:32-35 (NVI)

This episode tells us about three brothers: Martha, Mary and Lazarus. Taking them by figure, I would like to bring a teaching.

Lazarus - the brother who was dead.

Martha - is the one that said: Lord, it's been four days and it has a bad odor already . She did not believe that Jesus could do something for her brother.

Mary - instead of expressing any word, was willing to cry.

Many times we look to the situation of the lost (the dead) around us, and say: It smells bad, there's no way to save them. The attitude that moved Jesus and set him in motion to bring life to that young man who was dead, was the attitude of Mary.

Mary fell down at his feet and wept; when he saw her, Jesus was moved by the Spirit, and moved toward the grave to call Lazarus out. Most of the apparitions of Mary in the Bible is prostrate down at his feet: attentively listening to Jesus once, again breaking the vase of ointment, and again in this text.

In this episode, a crowd followed Mary and found Jesus, and many came to believe in him. The work that produces result is to prostrate. The work that produces result is weep before him in favor of someone. Thus, He moves, He acts, He calls, He resurrects the one who was dead!


Stay in the peace of Jesus Christ!
Saulo.

The blood of Abel cries out...

"If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it." Now Cain said to his brother Abel, "Let's go out to the field." While they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him. Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" "I don't know," he replied. "Am I my brother's keeper?" The LORD said, "What have you done? Listen! Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground."
(NIV) Genesis 4:7-10

Adam, the first man, whose name translation from Hebrew means literally "man", had at first two children, Cain and Abel. Adam typifies the humanity, but the humanity apart from God, the fallen humanity.

Adam had two male children. Adam had two first fruits of his manhood. See that the first fruit of the generation of Adam, on the other hand, has become a murderer. Cain killed Abel for being envious that God accepted his brother's offer but not his own. Abel, in turn, also a fruit of Adam, wanted to please the Lord, and sought to offer God the best part. The act of Cain turned him into a wanderer drifter on the earth.

This two sons of Adam, typifies, by what I can see, all the other sons of Adam. Inside our human nature, there is the wanting to know and please God. But inside our human nature, there is also the wanting to produce evil.

Paul has spoke about that in the letter to the Romans, when he said:

"So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?"
(NIV) Romans 7:21-24

Cain and Abel, this human nature, still fight inside of us, the men, and Cain is inside of us, and he is always killing Abel. But the blood of Abel always cries out before God. The mankind longs for the presence of God a for the justice of God.

But Paul follows:

"Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh,"
(NVI) Romans 7:25, 8:1-3

This battle ends in Jesus Christ. The blood of Abel finds rest. Its crying is heard. We don't need any longer to live this battle inside us, because Jesus Christ with His blood redeemed all the sin, and condemned all flesh in the cross, but when he rose, he rose to give us life, and a full and abundant life. We don't need to walk in this earth as a drifter, like Cain had. Though we can move in the heavenly places, in Jesus Christ, and experience that the joy of the Lord is our strength.

We can confess before God those things that belong to the nature of Cain; those things that lead us into and open the door so that our old nature be feed and manifested. Though, in our heart, we know we need to be close to God. The blood of Abel cries out, but Jesus want to give us deliverance today.

God wants us to live the full life, the abundant life in Him, in a way that we don't need any longer to cry, to mourn and to walk as drifters on this earth. We can, instead, be salt, light, and walk accordingly to the purpose of God.

Stay in the peace of Jesus Christ!
Saulo Oliveira Santos.

There is only one Gospel

"There is only one Gospel, not two, not three or half dozen, but only one. Not one for this organization and another for that other, not one for the primitive Church and another for today, not one for the preacher and another for the church member, but one Gospel that doesn't change, from a God that doesn't change.

Paul the apostle said: "But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let them be under God's curse!" (Galatians 1:8).

The text says: "He makes (…) his servants flames of fire“ (Hebrews 1:7 NIV), nnot an imitation, not merely a promoter of religious theories, but a flame of fire, which returns to men the things that God had to be the most precious things for which he paid such a great price. The cold intellectual discourses that demand the respect of the world will never serve to address the needs of this critical hour.

(...)

The non-inspired theology with his pale orthodoxy says, "Yes, I know the Bible says so, but look at the failures around us."

The inspired men cry, "Let God be true, and every human being a liar" (Romans 3:4).

The Word is true, all that is needed for it to be fulfilled is someone who believes in it. Men may be saved, they can be filled with the Spirit, they can be healed as the days in the past.

He is the same today, yesterday and for ever."

From the book "Este poder puede ser suyo", Tommy Hicks, www.peniel.com, pages 20 and 21.

Stay in the peace of Jesus Christ!

Saulo Oliveira Santos