Tag: salvation

Here’s Why You May Not Be A Follower Of Jesus

FollowerWithin Christianity, there has been a pervading idea that all you have to do to be a follower of Jesus is to say a prayer of salvation. In most churches we act like all it takes to be a Christian is a quick prayer, spurred by an emotion-driven, sermon. I wish it were that easy. Unfortunately, I do not believe this to be true. I’m not talking specifically about salvation. The Bible clearly says, “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.” I don’t think it matters whether that takes the form of a prayer on Sunday morning or a private declaration in a moment of desperation, saved is saved. However, saved does not automatically equal follower.

In the U.S., we have made the “salvation prayer” the primary focus, when it is instead a part of the entire Gospel. If Jesus’s objective was, “Go and get people saved,” we would do well by eliciting the emotional confession on Sunday mornings. However, the command is, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” We have missed the fullness of the command – it requires more than prayer.

So, what does this discussion have to do with The Whole Man? Everything. The purpose of this blog is to focus on the theological truth that Jesus is the only way to God, and on that way, He heals us and makes us whole. If the prayer is our beginning, what does following Jesus look like?

Deciding to Follow

To follow requires action. Following Jesus is based on the decision to go where He goes. We see this in the lives of each of the disciples. Jesus said follow Him and, without a confession of who He was, the disciples followed. It would not be until later when they would confess to who they believed Jesus to be. It is conceivable that a significant amount of time occurred between Peter’s invitation to follow Jesus in Matthew 4, and his confession of Jesus as the Christ in Matthew 16. Because Peter did not confess Jesus in Matthew 4, the time between his decision to follow, and his confession is not pointless. In fact, I would argue that time made his declaration more profound and impactful. Our decision to follow Jesus does not require a prayer. I’ve known a number of people who decided to follow Him and would later confess, “You are the Christ, to whom shall I go. For you have the words of eternal life.” Every time I have seen this, it is more beautiful than the last.

Committing to and Allowing Renewal

Making the decision to follow Jesus requires action. The commitment to follow Jesus requires the intentional “putting off” of your “old” self. This is more difficult than a prayer. This is the intentional decision to abandon certain, sometimes all, things that are present in your life. I’m not talking about smoking and cursing, but instead weightier behaviors that separate you from God, like hatred, anger, and drunkenness. We are required to surrender. We surrender our will to God and allow the Holy Spirit to renew our minds. This happens by taking in God’s word and through worship. We are then able to put on our “new” self, which is the reflection of Christ.

Obeying His Commands

Jesus said, “If you love me, obey my commandments.” Those commands include The Golden Rule, the Greatest Commandment, and the New Command. Jesus said He did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill the law. He told us that The Golden Rule is the Law and the Prophets. He was saying the entirety of the Law revolved around treating others like we want to be treated. Then He said that we accomplish this through loving God and loving others. Without love, we are not capable of fulfilling The Golden Rule. The decision to follow Jesus involves the decision to allow the Holy Spirit to cultivate a Christ-like love in you, for God and for others.

Jesus then gave His disciples the New Command to love each other and said that it would be the evidence of them belonging to Him. When we gather together and allow the Holy Spirit to generate unity and love between us, we are better equipped to obey other commands. It becomes more evident Whom we follow.

Following Jesus is not only a prayer. It begins with a decision. It is accentuated with the declaration of the belief we carry in our heart for who He is. It is not “action over words,” it is words in action.

Why Just “Getting Saved” Won’t Help You

The purpose of The Whole Man is to help men find healing and wholeness in Jesus.

With that in mind, I realize that as we walk toward this purpose, there may be readers who question what this looks like. For much of my early life I searched for healing and wholeness in many places. Eventually I landed in the offices of a number of professional counselors.

Professional counseling is an important part of finding healing, but it has a threshold in what it is able to offer. It’s absolutely a vehicle to move you forward toward healing and wholeness, but apart from Jesus it can only achieve a shadow of this desire. Professional counseling is more akin to pain management than a cure. The goal is to mitigate pain, so that it is bearable to live with, but pain is never completely eliminated. This is why some people go to counseling for 20 years. As long as the ailment remains, you must continue treatment. However, when you are cured you stop treating symptoms.

This is where Jesus comes in. When we enter into relationship with Jesus, the Holy Spirit carries you over the threshold into healing and wholeness. Sometimes that happens immediately, but more often it is a process.

Sadly, in an effort to “win” souls to Christ, the church has reduced the entirety of following Jesus into a singular event, namely “getting saved.” We can see this played out by the way that Christians use time as a measure of “spiritual maturity.” Typically when two Christians meet for the first time, they don’t ask, “What is Jesus doing in your life, right now?” Instead, they ask a variant of “When did you get saved?”

How long we’ve identified as a Christian has become the defining measure for how well we follow Jesus. However, if we are to experience the healing and genuine wholeness that Jesus offers; we must learn what it truly means to follow Him. And following Jesus is much more than simply “getting saved.”

I’d like to demystify what it means to “be saved” by Christ. It isn’t magic. At the most basic level it is believing that Jesus is who He says He is, that He loves you, and then doing your best to shape your life as a response to His love. To clarify, shaping your life as a response to the love of Jesus is about choices, sometimes very difficult ones, but choices nonetheless. It has nothing to do with your ability to “be good enough.”

Following Jesus begins with belief and is followed by actions in your life that flow out of that belief. As difficult as some of these choices will be, making the choice to believe is possibly the most difficult. However, this is your first act of faith in the person of Jesus and the beginning of following Him.

My friend Thomas put together a great write up on what it means to confess and follow Jesus, so I’m going to cheat and use that. There are three parts to consider: Salvation, Justification and Sanctification.

Salvation

This is the event that most Christians refer to when they say they are “saved.” It is the most important of the three and it is intended to place you in relationship with God. Salvation is about accepting the truth of your fallen and broken state and believing that God forgives you through the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.

What must I do to be saved?

1. Understand God desires close relationship with you. (John 3:16 & James 2:23)
2. Confess your sin condition and Jesus as Lord. (Romans 10:9, 3:10, 7:11 – leads to death and 1 John 1:9)
3. Believe in the power of His Resurrection. (Romans 10:9, Ephesians 1:19, and 2 Cor. 4:14)

Justification

The most meaningful of the three and is the experience of being made into the likeness of Jesus. Justification is about being adopted as sons and daughters of God and being made worthy to approach Him. Our worthiness is achieved by Christ’s work on the cross, in which we trade our sin and brokenness for Christ’s righteousness.

What must I do to be justified?

1. Accept by faith the gift of sonship (adoption). (Galatians 3:11, 26 and Ephesians 5:1)
2. Trust in the atonement/exchange of righteousness. (Romans 5:6, 9-11, and 1 Peter 3:18)
3. Become sealed with the Spirit in faith. (Ephesians 1:13, 4:21, and Galatians 3:14)

Sanctification

The most visible and how we live in the power of the Holy Spirit. Sanctification is a continuous process and enables an active life, faith and work. It has to do with the Holy Spirit empowering you to live a life that reflects the character of Jesus, the growing of your faith in who Jesus is, God’s justice and goodness and doing the good work of the ministry.

What must I do to be Sanctified?

1. Surrender to Repentance. (Romans 2:4 and Acts 2:37-41)
2. Seek to be presented, in Christ, to God. (Colossians 1:22, Ephesians 1:4, and Romans 7:4)
3. Rely on the power of the Holy Spirit. (2 Thess. 2:13, Ephesians 3:14-21, and Acts 1:8)

Salvation and justification are singular events that happen simultaneously. However, sanctification takes the rest of your life and requires other Christians. Maybe it’s time to stop managing your pain and start looking to the cure for your hurts.

In the next post, I’ll talk about some of the things you can do to grow in your relationship with God.

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