Once you put your hand to the plow…
Lot’s wife looked back…
The Israelites looked backed… and died in the desert…
I’m not looking back… I’m still stuck… in my estimation of “How much does it cost? Oh! Yeah, I don’t have that”
I wonder why?
I know God;
Met Jesus;
Worked with The Holy Spirit and produced two books.
I don’t doubt Him one bit or who He says He is… or what He can do, did do, and will do.
Oswald Chambers in his book “My Utmost for His Highest” explains commitment as “abandonment to God”.
Utter abandonment.
He refers to the Apostle Paul as the example of someone who has abandoned everything else in his life in order to be totally abandoned to Jesus Christ.
Paul didn’t care if you loved him or hated him because his whole being was in love with Jesus Christ and his mission of telling us about Him.
Paul is not dedicated or loyal to a “cause”; an “idea”; or beautiful church “building”… and he’s not even dedicated to us… or his historical listeners… he is totally abandoned to the person of Jesus Christ… the same Christ that knocked him off his horse when he was headed to Damascus; the same Christ that then blinded him; the same Christ that had him shipwrecked in a storm; the same Christ that sends him away from his own people to go and preach to non-Jews, Gentiles, Samaritans, Greeks… and anybody else he could be put in front of… speaking freely or in chains… none of that mattered… the only thing that mattered was that if they had not heard of Jesus Christ before meeting Paul… they absolutely would have after meeting Paul, and why? Because he truly loved Jesus Christ, and true love absolutely abandons itself.
I don’t feel like I love Jesus like that.
And not because I doubt Him.
But because I doubt myself… because I do know Jesus, a little bit, but know myself even better… … …
A famous boxing coach, Teddy Atlas, said he learned this lesson from an even more famous boxing coach… Cus D’Amato…
“Regardless of what a man says, what he does in the end, is what he intended to do all along.”
I was nervous on my wedding day.
A buddy says, “The truck is right there if you need it.”
But at the end of the day… I was married.
Jesus introduced Himself in the winter of that same year.
Wonder if I’ll hold up till the end?
16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said,
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.
And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
theemergingman.com 