Week One: Starting To Follow Jesus
Yesterday we ended with prayer, and today we’ll start with it. God likes hearing from us anytime.
Pray with your own words, or try these:
God, thank You for the gift of salvation: saving me from myself and bringing me into a healing relationship with You. Use Your love to shape me today, in the coming weeks, and for the rest of my life. I’m trusting You to make me new. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Christians finish prayers in Jesus’ name because this is one of the ways Jesus told us to pray. We’re able to connect with God on a first-name basis because of Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins. And we need this kind of connection if we’re going to live our lives His way and become more like Him.
Jesus lived His life with integrity. He loved His enemies, pushed back against injustice, and welcomed people that culture rejected. After we say yes to Jesus, we start the lifelong process of following Him. So, over time, we begin taking on those same traits. In fact, when Jesus summed up all of the commandments in the Bible, He asked us to love God with all we are and to love our neighbors as ourselves.
But is that process automatic, or is it something we have a role in making happen? It’s not one or the other—it’s both.
When he served as a sacrifice for our sins, he solved the sin problem for good—not only ours, but the whole world’s. … This is the only way to be sure we’re in God. Anyone who claims to be intimate with God ought to live the same kind of life Jesus lived. — 1 John 2:2, 5-6 MSG
Becoming more like Jesus is a process. God does the heavy lifting, but we can partner with Him in the work He’s doing. And for the rest of our journey together, we’re going to look at three ways we can do that:
Learning some of the basics of following Jesus—Who is God? What does it look like to talk to God and learn more about Him? What are some good next steps we can take? We’ll spend the rest of this week answering important questions like these.
Living like Jesus lived—During Jesus’ time on Earth, He modeled many ways of living that can bring us closer to God, help us connect with Him, and live like Him. These are called spiritual practices. We’ll spend week two exploring some of these practices.
Loving like Jesus loved—Nothing makes us grow more like Jesus than loving like He loved. During week three, we’ll take a look at what it means to put Jesus’ love into practice.
Pause to consider:
Which parts of my life do I hope God will make new? How do I want to partner with God to care for others and the world around me?