Come, Follow Me
In our world of “follow me,” who are you choosing to follow?
Are you on social media? More likely than not, you’re on at least one platform – and probably several. I know I am. With the rise of social media, an online presence is seemingly becoming more and more important, and it seems like everyone is trying their hand at becoming an influencer of some sort.
Almost every YouTube video ends with a “click below to subscribe” call to action, and according to a quick search at the time of writing, there are 549 million Instagram posts with #followme. A lot of us are fascinated with following influential people, and many of us want to be those influential people that others want to follow.
With so many voices filling this vast online space, it’s easy to click a “follow” button and become someone else’s follower. It’s so easy that we may not fully know who we are following. They may have said one thing we agreed with or written one post that we really liked, and we are now their follower. We may not fully understand who they are or what they stand for. Because of this ease, it’s becoming more important to be mindful of exactly who and what we are following.
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Follow Jesus
We may “follow” hundreds or thousands of people on social media, but in our real lives, we should really follow only one person: Jesus.
Jesus calls us to follow Him
Mark 8:34-36
34 And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 35 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it. 36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?
In Mark 8, Jesus is calling us to lay down the idols in our lives (money, material objects, comfort, etc.) and follow Him. The consequences of why we need to follow Him are serious: follow Jesus or lose your soul.
That hits hard. Jesus tells us that if we focus our eyes and lives on the things of this world, we will lose our lives and forfeit our souls in the end; but if we deny ourselves now for the sake of Him and the gospel, then we will save our lives in the end.
Jesus is calling us to follow Him for our sake, not His.
Jesus is our advocate
Mark 8:37-38
37 For what can a man give in return for his soul? 38 For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”
Jesus continues with why we need to follow Him. Jesus is our heavenly advocate (1 John 2:1) and will speak on behalf of His followers when we need to account for our lives to the Father. This is serious business.
When I stand before the Father, I want Jesus on my side – I don’t want Him to be ashamed of me, so I can’t be ashamed of Him today while I’m on this earth.
Dear God, we thank you for calling us to follow you. We live in a world where it’s so easy to follow other people, but I pray that we will turn our eyes to follow you first and foremost.
I pray that we can cut through the noise and the muddy waters of this world to hear and see your truth and to understand the importance of following you above all else. Thank you for Jesus and his sacrifice on the cross; He is worthy of being followed, and we pray to be faithful followers to the end. In Jesus’ name, amen.
There are a lot of people out there that we can follow simply by clicking a button under their name and profile picture. But I pray that as we move forward in our day, we will take the time to analyze who we are following and why, and to recognize that first and foremost we need to follow Jesus. He calls us to do so, and He is worthy of our attention and loyalty.
Blessings Friend.
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