The Me-Jesus

Lately, I’ve been struggling with the horror of just how easily deluded we are.  Knowing Jesus the way I know Him now, I look back over the course of my life and wonder who I was really following for the most part of it.  I believed in Jesus, but I wasn’t following Him because I was living my life the way I wanted to.   I went to church every now and then, when I felt like it or had time.  I had never really read the Bible for myself.  I read a Scripture here and a Scripture there, when I needed something like peace or happiness or hope.  God was my medicine when I needed it, and my silent co-pilot when I didn’t.  It was only during times of desperate need that I really sought God with all my heart, but then things would get better and I’d fall right back into my life of self-sufficiency.  The other night, as I contemplated our tendency toward self-delusion, I wondered, “Jesus, if I wasn’t following you all those years, then who was I following?”  Then the reality of my own self-delusion came crashing in like a tidal wave, because I immediately realized if it wasn’t Jesus I was following, then it was myself.  It was me.  I believed in Jesus but I was following me.  And it all made sense.

The reason the Me-Jesus was so real and so familiar, so comfortable and easygoing, was because it was me and everything I wanted God to be, so I made Him in my own image.  An image that didn’t ask me to change.  An image that didn’t cost me anything.  An image that didn’t require me to deny myself or face my flaws or admit my sins or turn away from them.  All those years I had been following the Me-Jesus.  All those years it was the Me-Jesus who assured me that I was following the real Jesus.  And then I read the Bible for myself, the whole thing, and I realized that I didn’t know God at all.  I only knew who I had made Him out to be all those years—a God who was patterned after my own likes and dislikes, my own understanding of the world and what was right and what was wrong.  I didn’t fear God because my god was myself.  It wasn’t until I read the Bible that I began to understand the paradox of God being both fearsome and approachable.

That’s the problem when we convince ourselves that we can have a relationship with God without reading the Bible or being in fellowship with other Christians.  The Bible is critically important to the life of a Christian because that’s what God has given us to keep us on the right path.  The Bible is what got me on the right path, because I had heard people preach messages from it all my life, but it wasn’t until I read it for myself that I truly began to understand God as a person and what He is like…..for better or for worse.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s important to hear good teaching from Scripture, but the key word here is “Scripture.”  God promises us that the Holy Spirit will guide us in all understanding if we ask Him and seek it in humility.   And one thing that you will understand when you read the Bible is that all of God’s plan throughout human history was to save us from sin.  It was sin that separated us from Him, it was sin that corrupted all of creation, it was sin that brought death and sorrow into the world, and it was sin that made it necessary for God to leave heaven, become a human being, and allow his own creation to spit in his face and flog him before He hung on the cross and suffered for six hours before He died.  It was sin that crucified Jesus Christ.  We are enslaved to sin, it is part of who we are, and God knows that, so He gave us a way to be set free from it.  He gave us a way to become a new creature where sin is no longer a part of who we are.  That way is trust in Jesus Christ and a desire to turn away from sin and back to God to be in relationship with Him.

The thing that the church needs to understand now, more than ever, is that when Jesus comes back, He is coming back to judge the world for its sin.  Acts 17:30,31 says that God “overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all men everywhere to repent. For He has set a day when He will judge the world in righteousness” by Jesus Christ.  Psalm 96:13 says, “He is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the people with His truth.”   Psalm 50:3,4 says, “Our God comes and will not be silent! A fire devours before Him, and a tempest rages around Him. He summons the heavens above, and the earth, that He may judge His people.”  Revelation 19:11 gives us a picture of what the Jesus of the Bible will look like when He returns, “With righteousness He judges and wages war. He has eyes like blazing fire, and many royal crowns on His head.”  This is not the Me-Jesus who was okay with my lackadaisical Christianity, because lackadaisical Christianity has no power to deliver from sin, and thus no power to give eternal life.  God wants us to have eternal life so that we can be with Him forever, but it will cost us our Me-Jesus.  The Jesus of the Bible demands trust, self-denial, and obedience, and in exchange we partake of His divine nature, we receive His holiness, and we gain eternal life.  The Jesus of the Bible was crucified to set us free from sin, therefore this means we must crucify our Me-Jesus to be set free from our own delusion.

So because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I am about to vomit you out of My mouth!...you do not realize you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked...those I love, I rebuke and discipline, therefore be zealous and repent. (Rev 3:16-19)

The Spirit is the one who gives life. Human strength can do nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and life. However, there are some of you who do not believe. (John 6:63,64)

Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter to mourning, and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you. (James 4:7-10)

And He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died for them and was raised again. (2 Cor 5:15)

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit...(1 Pet 3:18)

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. Through these He has given us His precious and magnificent promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, now that you have escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. (2 Pet 1:4)

Jesus Saves

I see all these people promoting their books and Bible studies and preaching series and this and that and all the other marketing-of-Christ. And sometimes I just want to shout: I don’t want to buy your book. I don’t want your Bible study and I don’t want to hear your preaching series on power or happiness or any other thing Christianity can sell me. I want to stop sinning. I want to have peace in my soul because I know that I’m right with God. I want to know how I can be holy like Him and I want to know how I can be in a real, authentic relationship with Him because my soul is hungry and my heart is thirsty and all the books and Bible studies and preaching series in the world won’t fill my soul like the authentic presence of God.

God wants to be in relationship with human beings, but he can’t do that until we are ready to turn away from our sin. It’s either sin or Him, but we can’t give ourselves over to both. No doubt, even after turning to Christ we will make mistakes and we will commit sin in weak moments, but after truly putting your trust in Christ as your Savior and Lord, there should be a perpetual desire in us to run from sin. Human beings were created to know God. We were created to be sated and satisfied by Him alone. You were created to be holy because you were created to be an image bearer of God. And if you don’t want to stop sinning, then you’ve never truly put your trust in Jesus Christ. Not the real Him, anyway. Maybe some counterfeit version of Him that is cool with your sin and your brokenness, and as long as you are happy, he is happy. But that ain’t the Creator-of-the-universe-Jesus. Or maybe you believe in Jesus, maybe thoughts about Him make you happy, but deep down inside there is something missing. The devil believes in Jesus, but he is a devil still. There is a difference between believing in Jesus and trusting in Jesus. Trust requires faith. Belief is acknowledgement of a set of facts, it’s knowledge without understanding.
Christianity is hard and Jesus is real. That’s what you need to know. Jesus was crucified to pay for our sins and deliver us from them, saying “Your sins are forgiven you, go and sin no more.” Faith in Christ means that you accept His sacrifice that paid for your sins, you trust Him enough to follow Him in obedience, and you desire to turn away from sinful behavior. That’s what you need to understand.

One day, Jesus is going to show up and it’s going to ruin a whole ‘lotta people’s day. Even those who thought they were ready, won’t be ready. Minds utterly blown all across the globe. Every single living human mind will say in unison, “My God, it’s really Him.” People who thought they were ready, realizing they weren’t. Shock. Awe. Terror. Joy. Mourning. Rejoicing. All happening at the same time. And the one thing you need to understand is the reason for Jesus’ words at Matthew 7:21, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father Who is in heaven.” Jesus says that they will ask Him, “Lord, didn’t we serve you and help others in your name, for your sake?” And Jesus says, “Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from Me, you evildoers!’” Jesus calls them evildoers because they did good deeds and they believed in Him, but they never put their trust in Him because of a desire to turn away from sin.

Sin matters because sin separates us from God, but God has offered us reconciliation and forgiveness through Jesus Christ when we desire to turn away from sin and back to God and put our trust in Jesus as Savior and Lord, Who alone quenches the thirst of our heart and sates the hunger of our soul. All you really need to know is that Jesus saves. Call out to Him. Go to Him. Be honest, cry that ugly-face cry, tell Him how you feel, that you're confused, scared, doubtful, addicted to porn, bitter against your spouse, mad at the church, tired of your kids, can't stop cussin', can't stop eating all the things, don't want to stop drinking or smoking dope, feel dead in your soul, don't wanna be nice to nobody, don't want to forgive, whatever it is, He already sees it and knows it. Jesus saves. Trust Him. Jesus saves. Cry out to Him. Jesus saves, because that's who He is. Jesus saves, because that is what you need.

It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, Whom you crucified but Whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed...Salvation exists in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:11,12)

If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)

After several days, Felix returned with his wife Drusilla, who was a Jewess. He sent for Paul and listened to him speak about faith in Christ Jesus. As Paul was discussing righteousness, self-control and the judgment to come, Felix became frightened and said, "Go away for the present, and when I find time I will summon you." (Acts 24:24,25)

Surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor His ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have built barriers between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you so that He will not hear. (Isaiah 59:2)

Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. (Matt 11:28,29)