Even If i Walk Alone

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

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Hear and Do

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We must do more than consume the Word of God. I’ll be the first to admit that I would rather spend all day, every day, studying God’s Word and spending time in prayer with Him. To some, that will sound like boasting, and for others, it will generate an aspiration to be the same way. But the reality is, as wonderful as bathing yourself in the Word of God is, it isn’t enough.

Even if we have more Bible knowledge than anyone else, and spend more time in prayer than the holiest of men, it all means nothing if we don’t do what the Word says. It’s not enough to read and hear; we must hear and do. It is in doing what the Bible says that we prove our love for Christ and demonstrate the genuine transformation in our hearts from death to life (James 1:22–25; 1 John 3:24).

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Following Jesus Is Hard

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Let me state the obvious: following Jesus is hard. If you think following Jesus is easy, my bet is you aren’t following Him in the manner His Word prescribes. It’s easy to say you follow Jesus. It’s even easy to place your faith in Him. None of that requires anything on your part, and you can take it back whenever that decision becomes inconvenient.

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The difficult work comes in living for Christ every waking moment of your life. As people born into sin, we all have an innate and outsized portion of selfishness that dominates our motives and desires (Romans 7:18). Keeping that alone in check often takes what feels like a Herculean effort. There’s nothing easy about living a holy life, so there’s nothing easy about following Jesus.

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A High Bar

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One recent afternoon, I was conversing with a close friend of mine who is not a follower of Christ. I would peg him as agnostic, but he is a thoughtful and intelligent man, so while he disagrees with my faith, we can have civil and rational discussions about it. In the conversation, he surprised me with a comment that was both blunt and telling. He said his problem with Christianity was the forgiveness issue.

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He said he could never sacrifice his own son, and his feeling is that instead of forgiving mankind, God should raise the bar and demand more from us. I thought he was going to say he struggled with forgiveness so couldn’t conceive of God forgiving us, but he went another direction. He considers a high bar a better solution than a merciful gift.

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Don’t Go Incognito

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Wherever you go in life, don’t go incognito. You should never disguise the reason for your hope or the light burning inside you (1 Peter 3:14-15). Our purpose in life is to know and glorify God (John 17:3), so we have a responsibility to be His ambassadors in a world that doesn’t recognize Him (2 Corinthians 5:20). How will people hear about Christ if we won’t be bold and speak the name of Jesus everywhere we go (Romans 10:14)?

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The world at large will never darken the doors of a church, so we can’t rely on professional teachers to get the job done on their own. We are all called to be salt and light in this world (Matthew 5:13-16). That responsibility is not for a chosen few, but for the entire body of Christ.

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Are You Worthy?

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Following Jesus is simple, but also a feat of incredible difficulty. Our sin nature is ferocious, relentless, and refuses to shrink back without a fight. In our humanity, failure is all but inevitable. Without the power of the Holy Spirit, we would never stand a chance. So, a spoiler alert, the answer to the question of, “Are you worthy?” is a resounding “no”. At least not in our own strength or by our own devices.

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God’s grace is not only the most beautiful and wonderful thing you will ever experience, it is also the necessary ingredient for any of us to be found worthy in His eyes. Praise God for His mercy and sacrifice (Ephesians 2:8-9). Praise Jesus for His atoning blood (1 John 2:2). Without them, we are all lost and without hope (Romans 3:23-24).

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