Following Jesus…..

14 years, 3 months ago 2
Posted in: Pilgrim's Chronicles

 

This mornings In Touch Devotional was great, I’m sharing it in it’s entirety!  Thank you Charles!

 

Matthew 4:18-25   New Living Translation (NLT)

The First Disciples

 18 One day as Jesus was walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers—Simon, also called Peter, and Andrew—throwing a net into the water, for they fished for a living. 19 Jesus called out to them, “Come, follow me, and I will show you how to fish for people!” 20And they left their nets at once and followed him. 21 A little farther up the shore he saw two other brothers, James and John, sitting in a boat with their father, Zebedee, repairing their nets. And he called them to come, too. 22 They immediately followed him, leaving the boat and their father behind.

Crowds Follow Jesus
 23 Jesus traveled throughout the region of Galilee, teaching in the synagogues and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom. And he healed every kind of disease and illness. 24 News about him spread as far as Syria, and people soon began bringing to him all who were sick. And whatever their sickness or disease, or if they were demon possessed or epileptic or paralyzed—he healed them all. 25 Large crowds followed him wherever he went—people from Galilee, the Ten Towns,[a] Jerusalem, from all over Judea, and from east of the Jordan River.

 

 

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.

 

 

I encourage you to ask God to fill you with the Holy Spirit, to make you fully aware of His presence…..

 

the pilgrim

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 31st, 2011 at 1:25 pm

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2 Responses

  1. Robert Christopulos says:
    December 31, 2011 at 6:27 pm

    Locks and more locks. There’s more to unlocking the secrets to life.

    Being able to know when it’s the Holy Spirit or another spirit-the world, the flesh, or the Devil- speaking entails the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus-and is clearly spelled out in the Book of Revelation. Too many people are dependIng on things they’ve been told on the air, been taught in their churches-but never carefully searched out in The Word of God. Too, if we are truly Born Again, the changes that God institutes will be an excellent guide to how to determine whether what is going on is of God or not. When it is of God, it will empower positive change, be in absolute agreement with Scripture, and maybe really bite you in the seat of the pants because God demands that you change to conform to what is right.

    Blessings and Happy New Year Bill,

    Rob