Even If i Walk Alone

Instructing and encouraging you to live your life as a disciple of Jesus

Daily Life

This Jesus Thing

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So why do we do this Jesus thing? Why would we devote our lives to a man who was last seen alive more than 2,000 years ago, and to a God we cannot see? Everyone is going to live for something or someone. But why Jesus? What compels us to live radical, counter-cultural lives for His sake? These are fair questions, and ones to which every Christ-follower should have an answer.

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We’ll dive into this a bit, but my immediate answer would be to respond as Peter did when Jesus asked if he would desert Him. Peter’s response? “Where else would I go (John 6:67-68)?”

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A Comfortable Relationship

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Few would admit it, but what most people want is a comfortable relationship with Jesus. We want answered prayers, help through troubled times, and comfort in crisis. Oh, and spending eternity in Heaven while escaping Hell, we want that too. Those are the comfortable benefits making Jesus so desirable to us, after all. Here’s where it gets a little uncomfortable. Jesus didn’t spend a lot of time talking up those benefits. He spent most of His time warning of trials and persecution, and giving stern warnings to those seeking to live a comfortable “religious” life.

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His harshest words were reserved for people just like us… those who were trying please God through comfortable and often self-serving platitudes. Comfortable Christianity is synonymous with Pharisaical living.

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Daily Discipline

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What’s the first thing you do when you awaken each morning? While I can’t admit to owning this ritual, I think the first thing we should do is thank God for the security and rest of the previous night and then ask Him how we can be used to build His Kingdom today. One reason we don’t live more powerful Kingdom lives is because we don’t begin our days with the intention of doing so.

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We have no plan, yet we expect God to do great things in our lives. If we aren’t positioning our minds, attitude, and heart towards Him, how can we expect Him to be able to effectively use us?

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Reorienting Your Life

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I was recently wondering what it would look like if I reoriented my life around the rhythms of the calendar. If you’re anything like me, you don’t take much time to celebrate or even breathe. In the Old Testament, God gave His people festivals and Sabbaths to observe. I don’t believe God does anything on a whim or without purpose, so I know He had a reason for these events. Could it be, as our Creator, He understood we need these times to refocus and re-center?

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Working with this knowledge, it makes sense to orient our lives today around similar rhythms. I’m not advocating we observe each of the Jewish holiday’s if you aren’t Jewish. They won’t have the same beauty or effect without being immersed in the tradition and history. But we can all build an effective and even joyful cadence for our lives based on the calendar of our own culture.

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We Are Worshippers

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We all worship something. It’s how we were created. Whether we realize it or not, we are worshippers. The only question is what, or who, is it we are worshipping? Saying we worship something or someone other than God is an uncomfortable admission. We don’t want to believe we worship unworthy objects.

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Many people and things will demand our worship, but only God is worthy of it. In fact, he demands we worship only Him. This goes all the way back to the Ten Commandments. Somehow, thousands of years later, we still haven’t been able to honor what He requires.

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