Follow Hard

Psalms 63:1-11 A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah. O God, You are my God; I will seek You earnestly; my soul thirsts for You; my flesh longs for You, as in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is; (2) so I have seen You in the holy place, seeing Your power and Your glory. (3) Because Your loving-kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You. (4) So I will bless You while I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name. (5) My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips, (6) when I remember You on my bed and think of You in the night watches. (7) Because You have been my help, therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice. (8) My soul follows hard after You; Your right hand upholds me. (9) But those who seek my soul, to destroy it, shall go into the depths of the earth. (10) They shall fall by the sword; they shall be a serving for jackals. (11) But the king shall rejoice in God; everyone who swears by Him shall glory; but the mouth of those who speak lies shall be stopped.


Peter James and John. The three disciples we can immediately think about and say “They were with Christ a lot.” They were with Christ at the Mount of Olives. They were with Christ at the Transfiguration. They were the only disciples allowed inside the synagogue ruler's house when Christ resurrected his daughter. So why were they more special than the other nine? Did Jesus love them more? No. Did they love Jesus more than the other disciples? Hard to prove, but I can say this for a certainty, They followed Jesus more closely. They were the ones that followed hard after Jesus. And that is why they were chosen out amongst the Twelve.


Psalms 42:1-2  As the hart pants after the water brooks, so my soul pants after You, O God. (2) My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; when shall I come and appear before God?


Peter James and John were like the deer, or hart, that longs for water. That is why they were selected out of the Twelve. They had great zeal. Sometimes this made them look like idiots. Such as the time Peter would pompously boast about how he would never betray Jesus. And then he ran in terror from a little girl (Luke 22:33; John 18:17). Or when James and John wanted to call down thunder and fire on a Samaritan village. Or when James and John and their mommy wanted to know who would sit at the right hand of Christ (Matthew 20:21; Mark 10:37).


However, when they were given wisdom and power by the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost that zeal was put to good use. Peter eloquently spoke against the Pharisees and would be first out amongst the Gentiles spreading the good news. James would be one of the first martyrs for Christ by being beheaded. And for the Jews to behead James meant he really had to have done something that got their attention. James finally drank of Christ's cup. John, of course would be the last apostle standing and would have the Second Coming of Christ shown to him on the isle of Patmos. Finally, their zeal would pay off.


John 6:44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who has sent Me draw him, and I will raise him up at the last day.


Like Peter, James and John we too ought to follow hard after Christ. Our seeking comes because God first sought us. (John 6:44). The seeking is a by product of God's intentions for our lives. He wants us badly and so first He came for us. What a wonderful Lord. What other religion has a deity that would do such a thing?


But why should we follow hard after God? What will it benefit us? Surely in the day and age of enlightenment and prosperity such antiquated notions are beyond the human sphere. We live in the Post-Atomic Age. Our science has done things the likes of which were only dreamt of during the first Great Enlightenment of the 19th Century. As Nietzsche said “God is dead, and we have killed him.” Why in the age of the iPod and Wii and Playstation 3 would we ever want a relationship with an invisible God? I can't touch Him. I can't manipulate His control interface so that He only plays the songs that I want to hear. So what's the point?


Philippians 3:8-10 But no, rather, I also count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them to be dung, so that I may win Christ (9) and be found in Him; not having my own righteousness, which is of the Law, but through the faith of Christ, the righteousness of God by faith, (10) that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable to His death;


Paul writes that there is nothing better than to know Jesus. That knowing Him is greater than anything of this world. He equates everything else as “dung.” You know, cow pooh. Its like the idea of choosing gold over dung. Which is valuable on the world market? Can you buy commodities of dung? Is dung a tradeable resource that one ought to invest in?


A life lived without the saving grace of God and without the knowledge of Christ Jesus is a life lived in a dung heap. Better for us to have never been born than to never turn to the arms of Christ. When you die your possessions do not die with you. You cannot take your iPod to the afterlife. There are no Wii games in Heaven, as awesome as that would be. The “excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord” is more valuable than silver or gold. If God paves Heaven in gold what value do you suppose he placed on it?


Its like asphalt. And asphalt isn't spendable on this plane of existence either.


-Nick


*emphasis added by the author