Moving to Follow

At daybreak, Jesus went out to a solitary place. The people were looking for him and when they came to where he was, they tried to keep him from leaving them.  But he said, “I must proclaim the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.”   Luke 4:42-43

I appreciate in a new way what Jesus is going through here.  He begins his public ministry with forty days of fasting, praying and temptation in the wilderness.  He then heals and teaches many but when he comes to his home town of Nazareth he is rejected to the point that people who have known him all his life want to throw him off a cliff (Luke 4:28-30).

Jesus then goes to the people who are responding and that is where we see the scripture above.  After a time of prayer, Jesus senses God's direction to move on, even though people want him to stay there, he needed to move on in the mission of the kingdom of God.

That is why a group of us are in the valley on a mission trip.  Jesus would later tell his disciples (Acts 1:8) that they would be his witnesses in the town they were in, in the state they were in but also in the neighboring region where people were of a different culture and also to the ends of the earth.  To follow Jesus is to be on the move and to know it is not about being accepted or staying just where you see a response.  Following Jesus means starting where you are but also going where he leads and he is always on the go.  It means leaving a place of acceptance to risk the unknown.

This scripture was very important to me several years ago when I moved my family 60 miles east to come to Victoria.  I was in a place I knew and in a place where I was known.  I had seen God move.  But that statement of Jesus about taking the good news to "other towns also, because that is why I was sent" weighed heavily upon me.  God spoke to me through it.  I moved.  Is he speaking to you?  How are you willing to move to follow?

For the journey...

Tim