What Does It Mean to Follow Jesus?
Matthew 4:18-25 

When Jesus called His disciples, they immediately dropped everything and followed Him. We might think, The Christian life must have been simpler for them than for us. When Jesus started walking, they fell in line behind Him. As He taught, they heard His voice. By watching His interactions with people, they learned from His example. But how are we to follow Jesus, since He’s no longer on earth? We can’t touch, see, or hear Him the way they could.

When Christ was about to leave this earth, He promised His disciples that He would send them a Helper who would never leave them. In fact, this Helper would actually live within them (John 14:16-17). Today we follow Jesus by hearing and heeding His indwelling Holy Spirit—that’s the closest guidance we can ever have.

The Spirit does for us all the things Christ did for His disciples. He guides us each step of the way and teaches us the truths of God. But His work actually goes beyond that. The Holy Spirit transforms us from the inside out and enables us to serve and obey the Lord. He helps us discover God’s will for our lives and then give us the desire and strength to follow the path He’s planned for us. All we have to do is follow.

An essential requirement for following Jesus is sensitivity to the Holy Spirit’s voice. The more yielded you are to His guidance as He speaks to you through God’s Word and during prayer, the greater your spiritual hearing will become. Hearing Him is the only way you’ll ever progress in your Christian life

Wonder of Wonders – On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.’

John 7:37

Patience had her perfect work in the Lord Jesus, and until the last day of the feast He pleaded with the Jews, even as on this last day of the year He pleads with us and waits to be gracious to us. The long-suffering of the Savior is truly admirable as He bears with some of us year after year despite our insults, rebellions, and resistance to His Holy Spirit. Wonder of wonders that we are still in the land of mercy!

Mercy expressed herself most plainly, for Jesus “cried,” which implies not only the loudness of His voice, but the tenderness of His tones. He entreats us to be reconciled. “God making his appeal through us,” says the apostle, “we implore you on behalf of

Christ . . .” What earnest, pathetic terms are these! How deep the Father’s love that causes Him to weep over sinners and, like a mother, to tenderly call His children to Himself! Surely at the sound of such a cry our willing hearts will come.

Provision is made most generously: Everything that man needs to quench his soul’s thirst is available. To his conscience the Atonement brings peace; to his understanding the Gospel brings the richest instruction; to his heart the person of Jesus is the noblest object of affection; to the whole man the truth as it is in Jesus supplies the purest nourishment. Thirst is terrible, but Jesus can remove it. Even if the soul were utterly famished, Jesus can restore it.

Proclamation is made most freely, that every thirsty one is welcome. No other distinction is made but that of thirst. Whether it be the thirst of greed, ambition, pleasure, knowledge, or rest, he who suffers from it is invited. The thirst may be bad in itself, and not be a sign of grace, but a mark of inordinate sin that longs to satisfy itself with deeper lust; but it is not goodness in the creature that brings him the invitation-the Lord Jesus sends it freely and without respect of persons.

Personality is declared most fully. The sinner must come to Jesus-not to works, ordinances, or doctrines but to a personal Redeemer who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree. The bleeding, dying, rising Savior is the only ray of hope to a sinner. Oh, for grace to come now and drink, before the sun sets upon the year’s last day!

No waiting or preparation is even hinted at. Drinking represents a reception that has no special requirements. A fool, a thief, a harlot can drink; our sinfulness is no barrier to the invitation to believe in Jesus. We need no golden cup, no fine china, in which to convey the water to the thirsty; the mouth of poverty is welcome to stoop down and drink of the life-giving stream. Blistered, leprous, filthy lips may touch the stream of divine love; they cannot pollute it but will themselves be purified. Jesus is the fount of hope. Dear reader, listen to the dear Redeemer’s loving voice as He cries to each of us, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.”

The family reading plan for December 31, 2011

2 Chronicles 36 | Revelation 22