We might know the right answer, but how should it affect our lives?
Who’s it all about? One word: Jesus. Not me, my bank balance or the size of my phone book. This life is about one thing: following the Master. But while it might be an easy enough phrase to say, it’s a whole lot harder to live it out. Our lives are a crowded place, with competing needs and wants bumping up against each other. How do we work things so that we really do look like we’re trying to make the story of our lives about Jesus Christ?
John 6 tells a great story. It’s about how a bunch of people got fed by Jesus on a mountainside, how they followed him about for a bit and how, eventually, most of them gave up. It was all too much for them, too hard to stick it out. But Jesus knew the truth of the matter:
‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe. All whom the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.’ (John 6:35-40, italics added)
See all those ‘I’s and ‘me’s? With Jesus, it’s all personal. From poverty to future plans, past hurts to present joys, we can take everything we have to him. Whether it’s celebration, inspiration, healing or guidance, Jesus was all about the relationship, the fullest of experiences open to all.
But hooking up with Jesus is about a whole load more than having an eternal shoulder to cry on. This relationship is a two-way thing, for just as we find a home in him, so should Jesus be able to find a home in us. His values, his concerns, his passions become our own.
That’s what it means to be all about Jesus: not faking the feelings or learning the words by heart, but having our heads and hearts led by him.
