I Have Decided to Follow Jesus

At the end of the church service tonight we sang the hymn “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus” for the invitation. This is a hymn that I have sung hundreds of times and my only real opinion of it has been how it tends to be so simple and repetitive.

“I have decided to follow Jesus
I have decided to follow Jesus
I have decided to follow Jesus
No turning back, no turning back.”

But tonight the song held new meaning because today, following Jesus holds new meaning to me than it did a few months ago.

Towards the beginning of my high school years I made the decision to follow Christ. I was raised in the church and I hated going for the longest time because it made no sense to me and I had no friends, and it seemed like as a kid my time was better spent sitting at home playing N64. But when I got older and I started using my brain I began to think about God and about how Jesus died for me. I started to believe it and then I realized that if I believe God and the Bible, then maybe I should start acting like it. I began to understand that my actions and my words should reflect what I believe, and so it was then that I started my journey of following Jesus.

And the following years after that were definitely the best of my life. I got involved in my church and I started reading the Bible. I remember I went out with my mom and she bought me a big, blue study Bible and immediately I jumped right in, eager to learn more about God. I started making friendships that would last (or so I thought). I went on trips, stayed up all night at lock-ins, and enjoyed what I guess is your typical teenage-youth group life. Deciding to follow Jesus was the best thing to ever happen to me.

But of course, life sometimes has its high points and it also has its low points. Lately, circumstances have not been all that good. I’ve been asking myself, “What can I learn from all this?” because the only thing salvageable from these circumstances is perseverance. I have been through sleepless nights, doctor visits, uncomfortable phone calls, loneliness, and a constant re-questioning of my own motives and abilities. Things have been hard and to make myself happy, I have been recalling the “old days” like some kind of retired old man sitting on the front porch just to pass the time. I’m 21; I don’t want to live like that, at least not yet.

My most common response to everything that happened was to just look at all the circumstances in shock and ask, “How did this happen? How did things turn out this way? How did I end up at the very bottom?” More specifically, I would ask “God, why did you let all this happen? What is the purpose of all this?” The thing I pray for the most is for God to do His will in my life. And many times I don’t pray for specific things. I always let God know what I think I need and want, but I know that God knows best and so I try to leave it up to Him. So I’m trying to live my life and take whatever circumstances come, but ultimately I depend on God for everything. When I need strength I look to God, when I need wisdom I look to God, when I need rest I look to God. And so as I was sitting there in the rubble of broken relationships, a church that proved to be not much of a church at all, a disaster of a semester at school, and not to mention other major problems. I questioned that decision I made years ago because I wondered why God would lead me there to such a lonely and desperate place.

The comforting thing I learned, however, was that lots of times following Jesus led people to lonely and desperate places.

“I have decided to follow Jesus
No turning back, no turning back”

Imagine if Paul were singing those words. If you want to talk about a man who went through it all for Jesus, it was Paul. He is one of my favorite characters of the Bible because he literally lived to tell people the gospel of Jesus no matter what the consequence. Paul was a Pharisee, a teacher of the law who persecuted Christians until one day when he was on the road to Damascus and Jesus appeared to him. After he saw Jesus, Paul made the decision to begin following him. Years after making that decision, Paul wrote about his experiences in a letter to one of the churches:

“Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles; in danger at sea; and in danger from false brothers. I have labored and toiled and often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked. Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for the churches. Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn?”

Many times Paul was put into desperate situations. Many of his letters in the Bible were written while he was in prison. The book of Acts includes accounts of circumstances when he was beaten or flogged. In fact, when that book ends, Paul is still under guard in Rome because the Jews wanted him dead. It seems like a more popular ending to that book would be “Paul finally got some property in a nice suburb in Jerusalem where he settled down with his wife and had some kids. He retired at a nice old age and lived happily ever after playing golf on the weekends.”

But when I look at the people who followed Jesus, I’m hard pressed to find a happy ending (at least from an earthly standpoint). I’m reminded of the disciples, 12 unlikely men who Jesus told to follow him. These men spent three years traveling with Jesus while he preached and performed miracles. They spent all their time with him and even saw him after he rose from the dead. These 12 men were closer to Jesus than anyone else who has lived.

So what happened to these men who spent those years with God in the flesh? Did Peter ever get that Escalade he always wanted? Did Matthew finally get to be a professional athlete? Did Thomas ever get to marry the girl of his dreams?

It really makes you think, because a lot of times we make it out to look like if you become a Christian, all that will happen to you.

No, all of those guys died because they followed Jesus. They were martyrs. Peter was crucified upside down, and the others faced similar persecutions. All of the disciples who spent all that time with Jesus died because of him, except for John the Revelator, who was exiled and then died. Also, there was Judas who betrayed Jesus and then killed himself.

So I imagine all those disciples before they died, whether they were in chains or behind bars:

“I have decided to follow Jesus
No turning back, no turning back”

What did those words mean to them?

What do those words mean to me and you?

I’m not trying to compare my problems to those of Paul and the disciples. Those guys were far more courageous and strong than I will ever be. I’m just saying that I’ve learned that Christians are not necessarily called to a life of comfort. I’m not saying that if you have money or if all your dreams come true then you are wrong, but that sometimes following Jesus requires giving up all those things. Sometimes following Jesus means you have to lose. Often times it means that. Whether that means your job, your possessions, your friends, or your even your own life; Jesus is worthy of it. After all, Jesus didn’t live a life full of comfort. His death was a brutal and humiliating one: he was crucified as a criminal, naked. And why did he live that way? Because he loved you and me.

Jesus said, “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy or me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” –Matthew 10:37-39

So tonight when we were singing that song about our decisions to follow Jesus, I couldn’t help but feel a little reluctance where I once felt reassurance. The decision to follow Christ is a dangerous one that should not be taken lightly. Look what it did to the people in the Bible. Still, we know that many things aren’t as they appear and what looks like suffering now will one day be turned into character and perseverance. And the amazing thing is that even if we come to the point of death we don’t have to be afraid, because the one we are dying for has already been there and conquered it.