James Meehan - Following Jesus Changes Everything

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Well, Jesus is better than anything and following him changes everything. Jesus is better than anything and following him changes everything. And as I say those words, I literally see some of you looking at me nodding your head, saying yes and Amen. Because like you, I have also experienced the truth that when you commit your life to Jesus, he changes you from the inside out and you start to see things in your life that are nothing less than miraculous. And as I said those words, I know there were some of you who were kind of a little bit skeptical, like you are open to the idea that maybe Jesus is the son of God, that maybe what he said is good and true, but you've never seen it for yourself.

So you don't quite believe it yet. Maybe some of you are sitting here listening to me talk, and at one time you believed it, that Jesus is better than anything but not anymore. Like you did the Jesus stuff, the church thing for a while, but it wasn't really working for you. Like instead of your life actually getting better, most things just got harder. And because it wasn't really working, you became convinced it's not really worth it. Wherever you might find yourself in either of those categories, I need you to hear this, that God loves you, that God sees you, that God wants you to experience the life and life to the full that Jesus talked about.

And that's why I think this series is so important because in this series, we are going to do our best to close the gap that prevents so many people from actually experiencing the freedom and fullness that is found in following Jesus. Because if I may be so bold, I think the gap often shows up because most people don't actually know what following Jesus looks like. Like there are so many people, if you ask them are they a Christian? Do you believe in Jesus, are you his follower? They might say yes, you might see the cross in their bio on Insta, but but for them following Jesus is just believing that he's real and praying a prayer one time in church so they can go to the good place and not the bad place.

And like don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you shouldn't believe in Jesus. Absolutely you should, but following Jesus is so much more than that. That is the beginning, it is not even close to the ending. And when you actually learn to follow Jesus, and by follow Jesus, I mean follow Jesus. Like when you actually start going where he goes, when you start doing what he does, when you start trusting what he says, when you start to become the kind of person who loves how he loves, all of a sudden everything changes because the words stop being just words and it becomes a way of life. And that's what we hope will be true of you, that throughout this series you will discover what it looks like for you to follow Jesus as simply and practically as we can make it for you. That's what we want to do.

Now, to kick off this series, we're gonna begin at the beginning of the good news. According to Mark in the Bible, there are these books right at the beginning of the New Testament called Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. These are stories about Jesus, the history of his life that chronicles the things he said and did and contains so much helpful information about what it looks like for us to today to follow him. And so we're gonna begin at the beginning looking at Mark chapter one. Today we're just gonna talk about the first half of that chapter, but in that first half, there is so much important stuff that's going to lay the foundation for everything we will be talking about in the weeks to come.

So it's kind of like give you a map of where we're going today. We're going to walk through half of this chapter answering four key questions. The first question that we're gonna answer is, who is Jesus? The second question is, what did he do? Third, what did he say? And finally, how do we follow him? How do we follow him? So starting in Mark chapter one, verse one, this is what Mark tells us. He says, The beginning of the good news about Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God. Any guesses what the rest of the book is gonna be about? It's probably the good news about Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God. What I love about this is that Mark is wasting no time to tell you exactly what he's going to you about, the beginning of the good news about Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God.

Now it's important we understand why we call it good news. We call it good news because it's news like something actually happened in history and we call it good news because it is good, because of Jesus, everything has changed for the better. Like if you just zoom out and look back past the 2000 years of history that have passed since Jesus walked the earth, you would see a tremendous number of things that have taken place because of what Jesus started 2000 years ago, like human rights, the abolition of slavery, the scientific revolution, the advancement of women in society.

So many of these things were driven by followers of Jesus in pursuit of Jesus. And if that was all that Jesus accomplished, it would be really good news. But Jesus was so much more than simply a historical figure who had a big impact. We believe that Jesus is the Messiah. That's a word that means savior king. He's the king chosen by God to save us from our sins. Jesus is our rescuing ruler and he's the son of God. He's God in human form. So question number one, who is Jesus? If you're taking notes, write this down the answer. Jesus is the Savior king and son of God. Jesus is the savior, king and son of God. That's just the first verse of the first chapter.

If you continue reading over the next eight verses, that idea of Jesus' identity and authority as the Savior, king and son of God gets echoed over and over again until we get to verse nine, when a different part of what makes Jesus so special starts to show up. So continuing in Mark chapter one, verse nine, here's what we see. That one day Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and John baptized him in the Jordan River. That's important, and then as Jesus came up out of the water, he saw the heaven splitting apart and the Holy Spirit descending on him like a dove, a voice from heaven. God the Father speaks. You are my dearly loved son and you bring me great joy. The spirit then compelled Jesus to go into the wilderness.

That's important, where he was tempted by Satan for 40 days. That's important, he was out among the wild animals and angels took care of him. So who is Jesus and what did he do? The first part of this chapter is all about his identity and his authority, but what we just saw there is a picture of Jesus' humanity, his relate ability, because this is the thing about Jesus. Yes, he is God and he's also human, and that's what makes him such an amazing savior because Jesus will never ask you to do something for him that he wouldn't do for you.

If you're a follower of Jesus, one of the things that God wants you to do is get baptized to go public with your faith. And that's exactly what Jesus did. If you are a follower of Jesus, you are supposed to follow the spirit of God wherever it leads you. And that's exactly what Jesus did. If you are a follower of Jesus, the devil will tempt you to do things that you should not do and you are meant to resist. And that's exactly what Jesus did. You see, Jesus is God and he is also human. That means that Jesus knows what it's like to struggle, to suffer, to experience really hard and ridiculously unfair things.

So whatever really hard and ridiculously unfair thing you might be walking through right now, Jesus has been there and Jesus loves you. He wants you to meet you right where you are and lead you to someplace better. Who is Jesus? Jesus is the savior, king and son of God. What did he do? That is question number two. And if you are taking notes, what Jesus did are Savior king and son of God is he became one of us. Jesus the Savior, king and son of God became one of us. He became a human being and lived a human life. He absolutely has all the authority in heaven on earth, and he knows what it's like to suffer. If we continue reading, the very next verse answers the question of what Jesus said.

Verse 14, after John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee proclaiming the good news of God. The good news of God is this, the time has come, the kingdom of God has come near. Repent, change your life and believe the good news. On January 1st, 1863, the highest authority in the land, president Abraham Lincoln gave the emancipation proclamation declaring freedom to every slave held in the southern states. And on that day, about 50,000 people were set free, but the other nearly four million slaves were still held in bondage, because on that day, he set people free legally, but it would be another two and a half years before every single one of those people would experience freedom in reality because it would be another two and a half years before the civil war was ended.

And then finally on June 19th, 1865, when union troops would show up to set free the final slaves being held in captivity, there was an announcement of freedom that was made available to all. But the reality of it came a little bit later. 2000 years ago, Jesus, our savior king and the son of God, he made an announcement. He proclaimed that the kingdom of God has come near that freedom and forgiveness was available to everyone. And on the day he made that announcement, there were people who repented and believed and they were saved. But still to this day, there are so many people held captive. There are enslaved by their sin, why? Because they have not repented. They have not given their lives to Jesus. They are still in rebellion, held captive by the powers of sin, death and the devil.

And there are some of you right now that you need to hear this, that today might just be the day that you finally experience the freedom that Jesus proclaimed 2000 years ago. Because today is the day that you respond to his invitation that you repent and believe you change your life and you follow Jesus. Who is Jesus? He is our savior king and the son of God. What did he do, he became one of us. And then what did he say? If you're taking notes, what Jesus said was to follow him. What Jesus, our savior, king and son of God, the one who became one of us, what he said is everybody everywhere is invited to follow him, to repent and believe, change your life and trust in him.

That's what Jesus said, but like how do we actually do that? It's a wonderful question, and that is the last question that we're gonna answer today in this message. Question number four, how do we follow Jesus? How do we follow Jesus? And what I love about Mark's gospel is right after Jesus proclaims the good news, we see several examples of people responding and putting into action the words that Jesus had just spoken. So if we keep reading, Mark chapter one, verse 15, what we just read, this is Jesus announcing, the time has come, the kingdom of God is near, repent and believe the good news. And then after saying this, Jesus starts walking beside the sea of Galilee and he sees two guys, Simon and his brother Andrew, they're casting a net into the lake because they were fishermen.

And so Jesus says to them, come follow me and I will send you out to fish for people. And at once they repented, they changed their lives and they believed they followed Jesus. Then when Jesus had gone a little further, he saw another pair of guys, James and his brother John, they also are in a boat. They're preparing their nets. And without delay, Jesus called them repent and believe, come and follow me. And they did. They left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and they followed Jesus. So how do we follow Jesus? How do we respond to his invitation to follow him? We do exactly what James and John and Simon and Andrew did.

We let go of our old life and we chase after Jesus. We repent, we change our lives. They left their jobs and their family to follow after Jesus. The way that we say it at our church is we do this. We commit to become fully devoted followers of Christ and we lead others to do the same. We commit to become fully devoted followers of Christ and we lead others to do the same. We follow Jesus and we let him turn us into people who fish for people because none of this is just about us. Absolutely Jesus wants to rescue you, and he also wants to invite you to be a part of his good plans to set others free. It was almost exactly 10 years ago that I said yes to following Jesus that I repented and believed. I changed my life and chased after him.

And for the last 10 years, I have been doing the best I can to become a fully devoted follower of Christ and lead others to do the same. And let me be very clear, it has not been perfect, and it has not been easy, but it has absolutely been worth it because when you follow Jesus, you start to see just how faithful he is. When you follow Jesus, you start to experience the freedom and fullness of life that he promises. Like when you actually go where he goes, when you start to do the stuff that he does, when you trust the words that he says, he will shape you into the kind of person who can actually love like he loves.

And then you experience a joy and a meaning that nothing in this world can compare to because your life isn't just about you. It is about the good news of Jesus getting in you, until it comes out of you and you are never the same. He's inviting you to change your life and follow him. That means to stop doing the wrong things and start doing the right things. Like for me, that meant starting to read my Bible, even though I had no idea what it was saying or what it meant, I just kept doing it because I knew that Jesus was there. It meant stop looking at porn and being held captive by this addiction that was no good for me or any of the people in my life. It meant surrounding myself with other believers, people who wanted what was best for me and pulled the best out of me. It meant changing my job because where I worked was not the most conducive environment for me.

A brand new baby Christian to resist temptation and be obedient to Jesus. So what is it for you? Whatever it is, it starts with a single decision. It starts with choosing to commit, to become a fully devoted follower of Christ. And as you do, eventually he will lead you to lead others to join you on the journey. And so for some of you, maybe the way that you follow Jesus is with that first decision, to trust in Jesus and commit your life to him. For others of you, maybe you've been following Jesus for a while, but today is the day that you get out of your own self, that you start to look to others and start asking the question, God, who do you want me to reach? Who needs to hear the good news? And how can I share it with them?

Maybe for you, it's coming back because for a while you've just been drifting. Whatever it is, all of us, every single one of us, we have been invited to follow Jesus, to join in on the work that our savior King began 2000 years ago. So let us be a people who commit to become fully devoted followers of Christ and who lead others to do the same. Because Jesus is our savior king. He is the son of God. He became one of us, and he has invited everyone to follow him. So will you follow Jesus? Will you commit to become a fully devoted follower of Christ and will you lead others to do the same?

Lord Jesus, we thank you that you are good, that you are faithful, that you have called us to so much more than we could ever do on our own. I pray that every single one of us would recognize you for who you are, that we would learn from your example, that we would listen to your words and we would choose to follow you with all that we are. It's in your name we pray, Amen, Amen.