Under the Influence: Media

Romans 12:1-2

“Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

This summer our college ministry at Clairemont Emmanuel is going through a series called “Under the Influence.” It is not a series on drinking, addiction or drugs, although that could play into the discussion. Rather, it is a series where we are exploring how we are influenced by the world around us, and how we can allow God to truly be the one who leads and influences us in all things. And so these next blog posts are designed to serve as a follow up from our group discussions in bible study, and if you are not able to be part of our bible study in San Diego, my hope is that these posts can stimulate your own self reflection to see how you are being influenced by the world around you.

This passage in Romans comes at a major turning point in the letter. In chapters 1-11 Paul has laid out a brilliant exposition of the Christian Gospel: How we are all sinners by nature and by choice, how our sin separates us from God and leads to death, how Jesus Christ saved us from the penalty of sin through his death on the cross, and not only saved us but liberated us to live for God. Then in chapter 12 he begins a discussion applying the Gospel. In light of this beautiful and glorious Gospel, how then should we live? What should we do in light of God’s lavish and undeserved grace? These two verses begin that discussion.

 Part of our response to the Gospel is that we are called to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. This will allow us to truly be able to discern what God’s will is, and in turn be able to fully live for him. So this transformation is critical to the Christian life. But what does it imply? There are many answers to this question, but let me offer two thoughts on how we can engage in this transformation, particularly as it applies to the various forms of media that we take in on a daily basis.

One, we need to be filled with God’s Word. If we want to know God’s will, we should fill our minds with God’s Word, where God’s will is so clearly laid out for us. Several weeks ago our worship pastor gave a beautiful message from Psalm 1 describing the person who drinks in God’s Word; that person is like a tree that yields fruit and prospers, that person is one who is strong and healthy. If we want to have a transformed mind, we must be filled with God’s Word. If we want to think Christianly, and have a Christian mind, then our minds need to be filled with truth for us to reflect and act upon. And being filled with God’s Word is critical for us to be able to think about the rest of our cultural input. If we are not filled with God’s Word, how will we be able to understand the aspects of our cultural input that are good and those that are not? And when it comes to thinking about the media that we take in, how does our bible input compare to our media input? Five minutes of bible input compared to hours of watching TV and movies, listening to music, and reading…whatever it is that you read… will not go very far in terms of having a transformed mind. To have any chance at having a transformed mind we must have God’s transforming Word of truth inside of us, and it must be our dominant input source!

Two, we need to think critically about what we take in from our culture. Being filled with God’s Word greatly helps in this task, as mentioned above! But we also have to start thinking about how we are influenced by the world around us. When it comes to media, how is it impacting me? It is naïve to think that we can watch or listen to anything and not have it impact us in some way! The question is not, does this TV show influence me or not? Rather the question is, how is this TV show influencing me?

So here is the challenge:  Take some time think about what the major sources of media intake are in your life. For some it may be music. For others, movies. For others, TV shows, especially since so many shows are now available online and entire seasons can be watched over a span of a day or two! What are your major media sources? Then for each of those major media sources, ask yourself the following questions:

1)      How is this shaping your understanding of truth and your worldview in general? Some media sources are explicit in how they try to define truth… The Matrix is such a movie where truth is clearly defined, and (spoiler alert!) it is NOT a biblical definition of truth! Other media sources are more subtle in their efforts, but a look behind the scenes and you can begin to see truth twisted, and worldviews fundamentally altered as the distinction between good and evil, right and wrong gets gets easily blurred. How are these views of truth and right and wrong shaping your beliefs?

2)      How is this shaping my values? One only needs to look at the past few years of media to see that what was off limits and completely inappropriate is now acceptable and mainstream. This applies to language, sex, violence, and much more. If we allow our values to be shaped by our media intake then our values will continue to change over time, and given the current trend, our values will get worse over time. It is common to get defensive at this point and argue that your values are better than your favorite TV show…that you have a higher standard than what you watch or listen to. But if that is the case you are still measuring your values against the changing cultural norm and not against God’s Word which does not change. And even if your values are better than the cultural norm, measuring up five feet from the bottom of a ten foot swimming pool will still leave you under water. The media will have a powerful impact on your values if you do not think critically about your media intake!

3)      How is this shaping my identity? The bible says some very clear things about who we are, what sin has done to us, and who we are in Jesus Christ. On one hand there are media influences that deny our sinfulness and our need for a savior, and get us to see ourselves as much better than we really are without Jesus. On the other hand, there are media influences that degrade our humanity and the beautiful truth that we are made by God, which skews our identity in a very negative light. What does your favorite media source say about your identity and how is it shaping your identity?

4)      How is this shaping my self-image? Every human being is made in the Image of God, the Imago Dei, and as such every human life is beautiful and precious to God, and should be beautiful and precious to us. We shouldn’t downplay our sin, but we also shouldn’t deny that God made us and we are a beautiful creation. Unfortunately Hollywood and other media sources have a nasty little habit of telling us that we are never good enough physically (and in Hollywood’s terms, is there really anything else important other than physical appearance?) and to get us to criticize how we view ourselves, which leads to a constant dissatisfaction with ourselves. Now should we take care of ourselves? Sure! But we should do so because God has made us and we should care about what God has made, not because we are trying to reach some unattainable physical standard set by the media. How does media shape your own self-image?

If we truly want to live in light of the Gospel, we need to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. We need to take in God’s Word and we need to think critically about our media intake. This will probably take time, so we need some patience as well and we need to keep relying on the grace of God to grow in this area! And thinking Christianly about our media intake may lead us to make some sacrifices in terms of what we take in and what we expose ourselves to. But it will also lead us into a deeper and more fulfilling relationship with God, which is worth every sacrifice that we can make!

A Critical Truth

2 Corinthians 5:21

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

Romans 3:26

“…he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justified those who have faith in Jesus.”

Justification, evidenced in the verses above, is one of the most critical doctrines of the Christian faith. Theologian John Murray notes that “justification is…the article of the standing or falling church.” So for such an important truth, it seems that every Christ follower should know this truth and understand the implications of this truth. Sadly, for many believers, it is simply a theological term. Hence the need for some further explanation and application.

When a person trusts in Jesus Christ for their salvation, God justifies them. What this means is that God declares the believer to be righteous. It is on the basis of this declaration of righteousness that we can stand before God. We have to be righteous to stand before a holy and righteous God. If we are not righteous our sin will keep us from God in his holiness (Isaiah 6:1-7). The verb for justified in Romans 3:26 is a legal term; we are declared or reckoned righteous…hence justification is a legal action. It is as if we stand in a courtroom, knowing we are guilty of all of our sin, but God as the judge looks at us and declares us to be righteous. God does not just say that we are not guilty…he goes beyond a not guilty verdict and declares us to be legally righteous!

This is an extravagant act of grace! We don’t deserve righteousness! We don’t even deserve a not guilty verdict. But we are declared to be righteousness. And the reason we are declared to be righteous is found in 2 Corinthians 5:21…God took our sin and placed it on Christ, and God took Christ’s righteousness and placed it on us. The theological term for this is double imputation, but a much simpler terminology is to call it a double transfer. God (1) takes our sin and transfers it to Christ, and he (2) takes Christ’s righteousness and transfers it to us. Therefore God looks at us and does not see our sin, but sees Christ’s righteousness. He looks at us and sees Jesus! And so we are accepted by God. Amen!

What is critical to note for purposes of application of these passages is that us being declared righteous by God has absolutely NOTHING to do with our own actual righteousness. Absolutely NOTHING. Now it is true that when we are saved we are regenerated by God…we are born again into a new life (John 3). This clearly involves some inner transformation! But we continue to have sin in our lives (I’m sure you don’t have to look too far back to see the last time you sinned!). And while we do grow in righteousness as we seek to live more and more for Jesus Christ, our actual righteousness will never be complete this side of heaven. There is no way that we can have the level of righteousness that we need to be able to stand before our heavenly Father. It is completely on the basis of Christ’s righteousness that we can stand before God, and we have received that righteousness, not based on any merit of our own, but only because of the lavish grace of God poured out on us through sending Jesus Christ to die for our sins on the cross.

Therefore, since our right standing with God (and hence the basis for us being able to spend eternity with God) is not based on our actual righteousness but only on Christ’s righteousness given to us, there are several things we can say about how this staggering and humbling truth can apply to our lives:

1)      Because our right standing with God is based on Christ’s righteousness and not our own, we do not need to live in fear or in guilt. Our salvation is secure! Even though we will all continue to have sin in our lives this side of heaven we do not need to be afraid of losing our salvation! If we have truly trusted in Jesus Christ for our salvation, there is nothing we can do to “blow it.” The bible shows us plenty of examples of murderers and various other quite horrible people who are redeemed by God! And we do not need to carry the weight of our sin with us for an endless amount of time, as if feeling more guilty or inflicting self-punishment will somehow atone for our sin. Christians will say that they believe that Jesus died for their sin, but they often live with so much fear and guilt it would appear that they functionally don’t believe that Jesus died for their sin. But since our right standing with God is based on Christ’s righteousness, and because that righteousness has been transferred to us, we don’t need to carry that fear or guilt anymore!

 

2)      Because our right standing with God is based on Christ’s righteousness and not our own, we do not need to try and earn our salvation. If we feel that we have to in some way earn God’s favor by our own righteousness in order to stand before God and spend eternity with God, then we will desperately make our lives about earning that favor. And we will very quickly realize that we cannot earn God’s favor on our own righteousness (because of our sin), and we will get very frustrated. However many persist in this effort to somehow make their salvation based in some part on their own merit. But no merit on our own can earn our salvation! Going to church does not earn us salvation. Being a “good person” does not earn us salvation. Tithing does not earn us salvation. Only the work of Jesus Christ dying on the cross for our sins and us receiving his righteousness gives us the ability to stand before God, both now and for eternity. Our salvation has been earned already by Christ!

 

3)      Because our right standing with God is based on Christ’s righteousness and not our own, we should be highly motivated to live for God! God’s grace in declaring us righteous should so overwhelm us that we take every area of our lives and focus on living a life worthy of the righteousness we have received. Holiness should be a personal desire on the heart of every single Christian! If some Christians err on the side of trying to earn our salvation when everything has already been done for us through Jesus Christ, others err on the side of receiving God’s grace and salvation and then not living in light of what has been received. If someone came up to you and gave you $10 million, your life will change! In the same way, God’s grace and love for us should so radically reorient our lives that anything in our lives that does not honor God should be cut out.

These are just three areas of application, but we could go on and on. Because we are justified by God, we can stand before God with confidence. We can be assured of our salvation and our eternal life with God. We don’t need to be afraid of death because we know that death is simply the last barrier between us and eternity with God. When a believer dies we can grieve their loss but not despair, because we know that they are in heaven with Jesus. We can encourage others to stop striving for something they cannot obtain and start living for someone they can. We have been justified by God, legally declared righteous…so let us praise God for his amazing grace in our lives!

The Value of Knowing God's Word

2 Timothy 3:14-17

"But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

To grow in your relationship with God you must be immersed in the Scriptures. To grow in godliness you must be regularly taking in the Scriptures. To serve God in any significant way you must be familiar with the Scriptures. And to share Jesus Christ with others you must be able to know and share the Scriptures. For it is through the Scriptures that God, his nature and his character are revealed. It is through the Scriptures that God’s moral will for us is clearly spelled out. It is through the Scriptures that we gain the knowledge and tools to be an effective servant. And it is through the Scriptures that Jesus Christ and his saving work on the cross is clearly and powerfully revealed. Any serious follower of Jesus Christ must be committed to knowing and growing in the Scriptures. God’s Word should be the most important thing in the world to anyone who wants to know God and serve God.

Not long ago, comedian Patton Oswalt made a guest appearance on the TV show Parks & Recreation, and as part of this appearance his character spoke at a city government meeting. In one of the outtakes Oswalt improvised a speech off the top of his head. What he came up with became an instant YouTube sensation. For eight straight minutes he offered his opinion of what the plot of the next Star Wars movie should be. It was nothing short of brilliant. His plot picked up and developed characters and themes from previous Star Wars movies, and not only added new characters, but added new characters from different fantasy films…including Spiderman, X-Men and more. All of these elements he wove (off the top of his head mind you!) into one coherent plot, with character development, suspense, and even teasers for future movies!

In order to tell such a cohesive story, Patton Oswalt had to have a deep knowledge of all of the elements of his story. He obviously had a thorough knowledge of the original Star Wars movies, both in terms of plot as well as characters. He was clearly familiar with other fantasy movies as well; for example he was able to not only mention the main characters of X-Men, but included (and insisted on including!) lesser known characters from that movie franchise. And he knew all of those elements from different stories so well that he was able to weave them into one story.

What if we as Christians were as familiar with God’s story as Patton Oswalt was with Star Wars and other fantasy genres? What if we knew the story so well that we could instantly draw from it at any point during our day? What if we could draw from God’s Word in any situation that we faced? If we could go as deep into God’s Word as Patton Oswalt can go into Star Wars, let me suggest that it would radically transform (in a positive way) our relationship with God, our lives, our ministries, and our evangelism. God’s Word is the source of life and growth in all of these areas, and the more we can get into God’s Word, the more we will grow with God and the more we will be equipped to serve God.

So what does your bible intake look like? How can you get deeper into God’s Word? Let me suggest five ways that have been frequently suggested to grow in our knowledge of God’s Word…

1)      Hear the Word (Romans 10:17). There are so many ways to do this, starting with hearing God’s Word preached every Sunday. But we can also listen to God’s Word in various audio forms, and there is a wealth of solid bible based messages available online.

2)      Read the Word (Revelation 1:3; 1 Timothy 4:13). If all we do is listen to the Word, or just listen to sermons preached on the Word, our personal intake and comprehension will be very low. Reading takes us deeper in comprehension, it puts us more regularly in God’s Word, and also helps us retain more of God’s Word.

3)      Study the Word (Acts 17:11). If reading is a good way to start retaining God’s Word in us, studying is even better. There are tools to help in this process, such as bible commentaries and dictionaries, but it is even better to first wrestle with a passage on your own, figure out what the message of the passage is and see how it applies to your life. This obviously takes some time and some practice, but the fruit is more than worth the effort!

4)      Meditate on the Word (Psalm 1:1-2). Meditation on God’s Word takes our reading and study of God’s Word and allows it to sink deep into our hearts. It allows the Holy Spirit to really shape our hearts in response to what we are reading. This is where significant spiritual growth begins to occur. And while it is good to block off time during our busy days to meditate on God’s Word, this meditation can occur throughout our day as well, so that we are constantly interacting with God’s Word.

5)      Memorize God’s Word (Psalm 119:11,16). Some will groan at the prospect of memorizing God’s Word, but it is one of the most fruitful and rewarding exercises you can undertake as a Christian! When you memorize verses of the bible you then have those verses stored up in your mind and in your heart…and they will shape all the other areas of bible intake, and they will be there for you as you go throughout your day.

Patton Oswalt has a deep, intimate knowledge of every single character of many different fantasy movie franchises. Because of that knowledge he was able to put together a brilliant story on the spot. If we dig deeper into God’s Word, we will be able to tell more of God’s story, tell more of God’s grace towards us through Jesus Christ, and live in light of that powerful story. And the best part about God’s story? It’s true! “All Scripture is God-breathed…” So wherever you are in your bible intake, make it a point this week to go deeper!

Grief and Peace

Psalm 125

 

“1 Those who trust in the LORD are like Mount Zion,

which cannot be moved, but abides forever.

2 As the mountains surround Jerusalem,

so the LORD surrounds his people,

from this time forth and forevermore.

3 For the scepter of wickedness shall not rest

on the land allotted to the righteous,

lest the righteous stretch out

their hands to do wrong.

4 Do good, O LORD, to those who are good,

and to those who are upright in their hearts!

5 But those who turn aside to their crooked ways

the LORD will lead away with evildoers!

Peace be upon Israel!” 

Our God is a God of peace. God desires us to have his peace. And yet in the midst of grief it can be very difficult to experience that peace that God desires for us to have. With grief can come feelings of pain, emptiness, loneliness, fear, chaos, instability, pressure, stress, and more… none of which are conducive to us being able to experience peace.  

 

But what is beautiful about this psalm is that God’s peace is not bound and subject to the anti-peaceful emotions that we experience in grief. God’s peace exists in the midst of those emotions! The key to this peace is found in the second verse… “As the mountains surround Jerusalem…” Author and pastor Eugene Peterson has noted that the mountains that surrounded Jerusalem made for a very good natural defense system. Jerusalem was naturally a well protected city. So even if Jerusalem was under attack, God’s people could look up and be reminded that just as they were protected by those mountains, they were protected in the same way by God himself. God surrounds his people. God is in control. Evil will not be able to thwart God’s purposes. 

 

Now even in the midst of grief there are circumstances and truths that can bring us peace. We can take comfort perhaps, in the fact that a long painful battle with cancer is over. We can take comfort perhaps, in that the person we have lost is no longer suffering physically. We can especially take comfort when our loved one believed in Jesus Christ as his or her Savior and Lord, because the bible teaches us that our loved one is in heaven, worshipping at the throne of God, and that we will see him or her again! But sometimes there are very few, if any of those peaceful branches for us to land on to find comfort. And we may find that even if one of those branches gives us comfort one day, it may not give us comfort and peace the next day. So ultimately we cannot find lasting peace within our circumstances when dealing with grief. 

 

But what this psalm teaches us is that we do not need to be in peaceful circumstances to experience God’s peace. God always surrounds his people! So we do not need to look desperately for something stable that we might be able to get peace and comfort from. Rather, we can always look to the mountains and see God lovingly and powerfully surrounding us. Regardless of circumstances we can always say that God is in control (Romans 8:28). And therefore, regardless of what grief and pain we are feeling, we can always have peace.

 

Several years ago I was leading a grief support group for several people who were going through a very intense time of loss, dealing with the deaths of multiple family members in a very short timeframe. The pain was deep, and the lack of peace was clearly evident. There was very little, if anything in that situation where one could find peace and comfort! In our group we looked at this psalm on God’s peace. The following week when we met again, one woman in our group shared this: “I realized after last week that I had never asked God for peace. And I asked him for it. And he gave it to me.” This woman was still in deep, deep, pain. But she was very visibly at peace, both in her mind and in her soul. It was and is a peace that can only come from God. And it is truly the only peace that will give us the strength to persevere through our time of grief.

Grief and the Presence of God

Psalm 139:7-12

“Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.”

Grief is a very natural, normal experience when you lose a loved one, whether it is a spouse, child, sibling, family member, friend or other acquaintance. And there are many different ways to grieve (fast, slow, internally, externally, etc…), all of which are perfectly acceptable. In most cases, the grieving process occurs naturally, with or without counseling from others.

This is not to say that grief is not hard. On the contrary, grief is incredibly difficult, and incredibly painful. Facing the reality of death combined with the loss of someone very close to you is nothing but painful. This pain should not be watered down in any way. However the “normalness” of grief reminds us that grief is not something that should be avoided, and is not something that needs to be fixed. Trying to “fix” grief will only lead to frustration, because grief is not something you can fix. It just happens. Just as you cannot stand at the bottom of a waterfall and stop the water crashing down, you cannot stop grief. And the “normalness” and different ways of grieving mentioned above also remind us that we need not find one specific model for grief that everyone should conform to. Grief will look different for different people.

So for the Christian, what is important in grief is not so much how we grieve, but who we grieve with. And this is where Psalm 139 becomes an immense source of comfort in the midst of grief. The verses above are rich and deep and profound. But they also contain a profoundly simple truth. God is with me. God is with me. Wherever I go, whatever I do, whatever I am feeling…God is with me. And God is not the fair weather fan, only showing up when our lives are great and wonderful. God is with us in the depths, in the darkness, in our pain. Even if the pain makes it difficult to subjectively experience God’s presence, we can know objectively that God is with us.

Therefore because of God’s presence in our lives we can and should grieve with God. Grieving with God will not make the pain any less painful. But grieving with God will give us peace and hope, and keep us from despair. Grieving with God places us in front of one who has not only wept over death but has also conquered death through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And grieving with God reminds us that no matter how much the death of a loved one turns our world upside down, God does not change, his character does not change, and his purposes do not change. So the truths about God that comforted us before our time of grief are the exact same truths that can comfort us when we do go through grief.

Because of God’s presence in our lives we can say with confidence that it is far easier to grieve with God than without him. And not only is it easier to grieve with God, it is better to grieve God. Grieving with God can give us more hope and comfort and peace, but grieving with God can also turn grief into a time of deep spiritual growth, so that we can follow God with a faith and perseverance that we did not have before our time of grief.

The common refrain I hear from people who have grieved with God is this: “I don’t know how people do this without God.” How true. I have seen people grieve without God who were paralyzed by pain and despair for years. But I have seen people grieve with God who have let God into their pain, been comforted by who God is, grown in their relationship with God, and come out of their time of intense grief ready and excited to serve God in deeper ways. My prayer for anyone who is grieving who does not know God is that they would come to know and experience the God of all comfort (2 Corinthians 1:3-5) through accepting Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord. And my prayer for anyone who does know God is that they would grieve with God, that they would allow God into their pain, and experience the profound hope, comfort, and peace that can only come from the ever-present God.

On the way...

Mark 10:52

“And Jesus said to him, ‘Go your way; your faith has made you well.’ And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him on the way.”

This chapter in the Gospel of Mark is rich in discipleship material…what it means to be a devoted follower, a disciple of Jesus Christ. And interestingly, almost all of the examples of discipleship in this chapter are negative ones, namely the rich young man who cannot follow Jesus because he is too attached to his possessions, and the brothers James and John who arrogantly ask Jesus for seats of honor with Jesus in glory…what amounts to one of the more self-centered prayers ever prayed! But then at the end of the chapter, as Jesus is leaving Jericho and heading towards Jerusalem and heading towards the cross, we come across a blind beggar named Bartimaeus.

Now Bartimaeus is a fascinating guy, and serves as a great case study for what it means to follow Jesus. One, he gets that Jesus is the promised Messiah, and his pleas for mercy indicate he had a greater insight (ironically) into who Jesus was as the Messiah than most people who could see (the majority of the crowd was not looking for mercy and grace but was looking for a conquering king on the road to Jerusalem). Two, he is relentless in his crying out for Jesus; such desperation and need for Jesus stands in stark contrast to the selfish request of James and John in the verses immediately preceding and is a refreshing reminder of our own desperate need for a savior. And three, and perhaps most importantly, once Jesus tells him to go his own way and heals him, Bartimaeus with his new found sight chooses to follow Jesus “along the road,” or “on the way.” And to follow Jesus on the way meant following Jesus on the road from Jericho to Jerusalem. It is not an easy road. It is over twenty miles with an elevation gain of 3,000 feet. But in addition to the physical demands, Jesus is not headed to his coronation. He is headed to the cross. He is headed to his death.

So for us to follow Jesus on the way means that we should not expect a pleasure cruise. We cannot and should not expect the way of faith in Jesus Christ to be easy. We need to understand that there is a difference between blessing and ease. It can be so easy for Christians to equate those terms, and then when life gets difficult we fail to see God’s blessing and we get easily discouraged. So when life gets difficult (and face it, life does get difficult…that is simply reality), we should not be surprised and stop our journey, but we should persevere and keep going (Hebrews 12:1-2). We should follow Jesus’ example and be willing as he calls us to deny ourselves and to take up our cross and follow him (Mark 8:34-35). And we should be willing to pour ourselves out in self-sacrificial love for each other and for the sake of the gospel (1 John 4:10-12).

To be a follower of Jesus Christ means that we realize who Jesus is, recognize our own deep need for him (we cannot save ourselves!), and then when Jesus has lavished his saving grace in our lives, that we get up and follow Jesus wherever he leads us. Following Jesus on the way does lead to the cross. But it also leads to blessing, and ultimately leads to glory. Will you follow Jesus on the way?