“Come, follow me“ Jesus said, “and I will make you fishers of men.”(Mark 1:17)
The verb in a sentence “follow me” is “follow”. Jesus did not say “find a Buddha in your heart!” or “make peace inside!” or “build up the ability for love”, but clearly he said, “follow” me. In here there exists the second core of Christianity. What does it mean by following Jesus in details? As we meditated in yesterday’s text, people have a tendency to religionize the characteristics of Christianity. Many people say that they would go to church for recovery or mental comfort from fear of death or painful life. What is worse, some people go to church in order to cut off smoking, gambling or just to live a good life. These are not Christian essentials. The center of Christianity does not remain in abstract or concrete joy or happiness or living as a role model, but in “following” Jesus who is a real historical person.
Here we’d better listen to Bonhoeffer’s explanation. Once he made definition of Christian identity as “following Jesus”(Nachfolge Christi). This does not mean simply taking the ideas of Jesus Christ or having religious dialogue with Him or learning mystery of God’s world through Him, but means to follow His life in details. It is like Martin Luther’s saying, “If Jesus is in the hell, I will choose to stay in the hell.”
If they were a little thoughtful Christians, they might understand explanation above. But they do not think seriously about what following Jesus means exactly. Being for others or new being or being a pioneer for world mission or nationwide evangelism, they do not have concrete ideas. Most people could think that having diligent church life could be a living like Jesus. That’s right. It must be true that living in that way could be a living to follow Jesus in a sense. The more people who are living like this, the brighter light Christian church could get as a community following Jesus.
But the basic meaning for following Jesus is not a partial following, but a total following. It means the fact that our total being should rely on Jesus Christ. Our thinking, our value, our resolution, our final destiny should be concentrated only on Jesus just like a person, who fell in love with someone and then thought about only that person for 24 hours. These kinds of people could be called followers for Jesus.
Do not misunderstand this. Does it mean we could neglect whatsoever except following Jesus? Does it mean that we should abandon jobs, hobbies? No way! The life style with those things is precious too, but the contents of life should be filled with Christ totally.
Considering as trinitarianistic point of view, following Jesus means that we rely on the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a power of life. So when we say we rely on the Holy Spirit, it means a living totally directed toward life. Now the meaning of totally following Jesus seems to come closer to us in full sense. It means we must be living life-oriented life. When we eat, take a walk, get conversation with a friend, learn or teach. it is possible for us to have a life-oriented life. When such direction toward life as well as toward Jesus incident could be harmonized in our life, it might be a living totally following Jesus.
Lord, hope all of my soul to listen carefully only to you. Amen.
The verb in a sentence “follow me” is “follow”. Jesus did not say “find a Buddha in your heart!” or “make peace inside!” or “build up the ability for love”, but clearly he said, “follow” me. In here there exists the second core of Christianity. What does it mean by following Jesus in details? As we meditated in yesterday’s text, people have a tendency to religionize the characteristics of Christianity. Many people say that they would go to church for recovery or mental comfort from fear of death or painful life. What is worse, some people go to church in order to cut off smoking, gambling or just to live a good life. These are not Christian essentials. The center of Christianity does not remain in abstract or concrete joy or happiness or living as a role model, but in “following” Jesus who is a real historical person.
Here we’d better listen to Bonhoeffer’s explanation. Once he made definition of Christian identity as “following Jesus”(Nachfolge Christi). This does not mean simply taking the ideas of Jesus Christ or having religious dialogue with Him or learning mystery of God’s world through Him, but means to follow His life in details. It is like Martin Luther’s saying, “If Jesus is in the hell, I will choose to stay in the hell.”
If they were a little thoughtful Christians, they might understand explanation above. But they do not think seriously about what following Jesus means exactly. Being for others or new being or being a pioneer for world mission or nationwide evangelism, they do not have concrete ideas. Most people could think that having diligent church life could be a living like Jesus. That’s right. It must be true that living in that way could be a living to follow Jesus in a sense. The more people who are living like this, the brighter light Christian church could get as a community following Jesus.
But the basic meaning for following Jesus is not a partial following, but a total following. It means the fact that our total being should rely on Jesus Christ. Our thinking, our value, our resolution, our final destiny should be concentrated only on Jesus just like a person, who fell in love with someone and then thought about only that person for 24 hours. These kinds of people could be called followers for Jesus.
Do not misunderstand this. Does it mean we could neglect whatsoever except following Jesus? Does it mean that we should abandon jobs, hobbies? No way! The life style with those things is precious too, but the contents of life should be filled with Christ totally.
Considering as trinitarianistic point of view, following Jesus means that we rely on the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a power of life. So when we say we rely on the Holy Spirit, it means a living totally directed toward life. Now the meaning of totally following Jesus seems to come closer to us in full sense. It means we must be living life-oriented life. When we eat, take a walk, get conversation with a friend, learn or teach. it is possible for us to have a life-oriented life. When such direction toward life as well as toward Jesus incident could be harmonized in our life, it might be a living totally following Jesus.
Lord, hope all of my soul to listen carefully only to you. Amen.
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