#22: HARD TIMES-THE MARK OF DISCIPLESHIP

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Many of His followers heard this and said, “This teaching is too hard, who can listen to it?”. John 6:60 (GNB)

The Word of God is His instrument for changing lives. For this change to occur, there has to be a turnaround from former ways, from former lifestyles. When the Word comes and is pointing at these areas of your life, it usually appears as though “this is becoming too much, this is not what I signed up for. I better sign out now before I become a piece of rag”. When these hard times come, Jesus will never be insisting you stay back. It is a choice we have to make.

In verse 67 Jesus turned to His disciples and made the floor open. The answer they gave in verse 68-69 is something that is an indelible mark of discipleship.
Simon Peter answered him, “LORD, to whom would we go? You have the Word that gives eternal life. And now we believe You are the Holy One who has come from God.”.

Peter and the other disciples were not going to leave Jesus, no matter how hard His dealings were with them, because beforehand they had denied family, wealth, friends and themselves to follow Jesus. There was absolutely nothing they would fall back on except what was ahead of them-eternal life, which they found in Jesus.

Is this true of you? Do you truly have nothing to fall back on? Have you forsaken all for the sake of the kingdom? When hard dealings come in your work with God like when Abraham was asked to sacrifice his beloved son, you need a reason to keep pressing on.

RESOLVE: find an anchor in Christ today. Abraham found God as his everlasting possession, and that is why he could attempt sacrificing Isaac, the disciples found Jesus as the source of eternal life from God. Have you found your reason to not sway away from God when there are human reasons around why you should?

Happy Sunday

Written by DiDi.

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