I recently decided to start sharing some Bible study insights with my family through a group chat on WhatsApp, and figured why not share it here too. I’ve combined Parts 1 and 2, since Part 1 was so short.
How to Follow God: Part 1 – Believe and Follow
When we first gave our lives to Jesus, many of us prayed something like this: “Jesus, I invite you to come into my life…”
Is this how it happened with His followers in the Bible?
He “came into their life”, but the expectation was set immediately with 2 words.
He said, “Follow me…” (Matthew 4:18-22, 9:9; Mark 1:16-20, 2:14; Luke 5:1-11, 5:27-28; John 1:43-51)
Wanting and believing that we SHOULD follow Him, is step 1.
But then knowing what it means to actually follow Him is where we need to take a closer look.
I’m not saying that we need to have everything figured out before following Jesus.
Understanding who God is, and the growing and maturing in Him comes with continuing to follow Him and doing what He says.
Notice that the disciples, who at this point in Mark 4:41 had already made the decision to follow Jesus, reacted to learning He could command the weather:
Already having decided to follow Jesus: “They were terrified and asked each other, ‘Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!'”
We start by BELIEVING (faith), but FOLLOWING requires obedience (which is “works”).
For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
(James 2:26)
What does that look like for our own lives? We’ll get into that next.
if we start by BELIEVING (faith)– believe what, exactly?
How to Follow God: Part 2 – Understanding the Story
In movies, there’s the type where the story plays out in order; you start from the beginning, and end… at the end.
This is called linear storytelling.
There’s also the type of movie where the opening scene tends to make very little sense (yet), like an interaction between two characters you don’t recognize, talking about things you don’t understand (yet).
The screen would then go black with the words, “…5 years earlier.”
This movie started with a scene that was “later”, before jumping back in time and then proceeds to tell the rest of the story from an earlier point in time. Like a character’s childhood, or when they first enlisted in the army. It spends the rest of the movie introducing you to the characters and the plot. By the time you get to the end of the movie, it likely revisits the opening scene– but this time the scene finally makes sense!
This is non-linear storytelling.
These two types of storytelling are like how Jews and Gentiles have experienced God’s story.
Now, I know this isn’t a perfect analogy. After all, there’s Old Testament prophecies that have yet to take place, so the story isn’t fully “linear.” These are glimpses of the future.
However, bear with me.
Let’s just say Jews in Jesus’ day were experiencing God’s story in a “linear” way. Their knowledge of God’s story did start with Adam and Eve, then Noah, the story of Abraham, Isaac & Jacob, Israel, Moses, etc. in a linear fashion.
The “beginning” for Gentiles/non-Jewish believers tends to be in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John with the birth and ministry of Jesus.
We would do well to notice that the very first verse of the first “Gospel” in our New Testament begins with, “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.”
Let me tell you, that this is a verse loaded with key identifiers for the Jewish reader.
Jesus is the Christ (Messiah), meaning He’s the expected King. Which is why it’s important to point out he’s the “son of David”. It also says he’s a descendant of Abraham. Well he’s clearly a descendant of Abraham if he’s a descendant of David. Again, this goes beyond what a surface level reading reveals. A Jewish reader would take this as a reminder of God’s promise to Abraham– as well as David!
See these articles for more: The Genealogy of Jesus | The Promised Seed
By the time John the Baptist appears, those people that had “ears to hear”, understood what they had been hearing regularly, Shabbat (Sabbath) after Shabbat, at the reading of the Tanakh (our “Old Testament”) in Synagogue regarding the Messiah.
They had started from the “beginning” of the “linear storytelling” movie.
John’s appearance was in direct fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy.
Isaiah 40:3 speaks of a voice crying in the wilderness, preparing the way of the Lord, which John embodied (Matthew 3:3, Mark 1:3).
I can only imagine the goosebumps that some people must have felt when recognizing John as the “voice crying out in the wilderness” prophesied in Isaiah 40.
If John is the “voice crying out in the wilderness” this means Messiah is coming! The promised King of Israel, who the nations will come from all over the world to worship and will establish an eternal Kingdom!
John removes all doubt when questioned by the priests about his identity, and tells them directly that this is EXACTLY who he is:
23 He said, “I am a voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as Isaiah the prophet said.” (John 1:23)
So what’s the point?
The point is, that those as familiar with Old Testament scriptures as these Jews had all the background and context necessary to understand what was going on.
If John the Baptist is the voice crying out, “Prepare the way for Yahweh in the wilderness; Make smooth in the desert a highway for our God.” (Isaiah 40:3)
This would bring other connections to mind for them.
Such as:
Malachi 3:1: “Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts.”
You might be thinking, “well this is referring to preparing the way for Yahweh, not the Messiah.”
Well I’ll try not to divert too much, but the following are some interesting connections that we should explore in further posts.
Look at Zechariah 14:
What does the scene look like, when Yahweh is King?
6 And it will be in that day, that there will be no light; the luminaries will dwindle. 7 And it will be a unique day which is known to Yahweh, neither day nor night, but it will be that at evening time there will be light. 8 And it will be in that day, that living waters will flow out of Jerusalem, half of them toward the eastern sea and the other half toward the western sea; it will be in summer as well as in winter.
“9 And Yahweh will be king over all the earth; in that day Yahweh will be the only one, and His name one.”
Hmm.
Does this sound familiar?
Revelation 11:15: “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever,”
Revelation 22: Then he showed me a river of the water of life, bright as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, 2 in the middle of its street. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. 3 And there will no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His slaves will serve Him; 4 and they will see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads. 5 And there will no longer be any night, and they will not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illumine them, and they will reign forever and ever.
Also:
John 10:30: “I and the Father are one.”
So now to the point:
Following God starts by BELIEVING (faith), and FOLLOWING (obedience).
How do we believe?
Romans 10:17: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”
What is the word of Christ?
- John 1:1 – In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
- John 1: 14 – And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.
- John 5 – 39 You search the Scriptures [which scriptures would they have been searching in Jesus’ day? Only the Tanakh (Old Testament) had been written!] because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that bear witness about Me; 40 and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.
- John 5 – 45 Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father; the one who accuses you is Moses, in whom you have set your hope. 46 For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me. 47 But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?”
- Revelation 1:2: “who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw.”
And “the word at work in us”, which we will explore in depth in the days ahead.
Hint: Jeremiah 31:31-34 and Ezekiel 36:26-28
- 1 Thessalonians 2:13: “And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.”
- 1 Peter 1:23-25: “You have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God; for ‘All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever.’ And this word is the good news that was preached to you.”
This is why we need to fully understand what the gospel is. There are so many things we need to re-learn!
Luke 24:44-45:
“He [Jesus] said to them, ‘This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.’ Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.”
Those of us who started our journey with Jesus through the New Testament, and have stayed there, are like the person watching the “non-linear storytelling” movie.
Imagine watching the movie, the screen goes dark with the words, “…5 years earlier.” And you shut it off because you think, “nah the rest isn’t important anymore, I already know what happens.”
This isn’t a perfect analogy, but I think it gets some of the point across.
You can imagine what issues can happen if someone doesn’t finish the movie, and then goes to try to tell other people about the movie.
/////HERE’S WHAT WE MISS/////
How about this most incredible detail:
The larger context of the “greatest commandments” Jesus quoted. (Matthew 22)
“You shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.”
Jesus was quoting out of Deuteronomy 6:5.
This was right after Moses had given the 10 commandments when God follow up with saying, “Oh that they had such a heart in them, that they would fear Me and keep all My commandments all the days, that it may be well with them and with their sons forever!” (Deut. 5:29)
The 10 commandments. Deuteronomy 5. Written on stone.
BUT GOD wants them to have the type of heart to keep all his commandments. (Keep = samar: watch, protect, guard)
This is the context for when God asks His people to love Him with everything they’ve got in Deuteonomy 6:5.
In fact, read the very next verse. (6:6): These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart.
God makes a way for that to happen. We’ll get to that in a moment.
Now for the other “greatest commandment” Jesus identified in Matthew 22.
Let’s read it in its context.
Leviticus 19:
18 You shall not take vengeance, and you shall not keep your anger against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am Yahweh.
19 *‘You are to keep My statutes. *
Loving God and loving one another looks like keeping His commandments.
1 John 5:2–3 (LSB)
2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and do His commandments. 3 For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.
Remember that God saved them first, made them His people, THEN gives His commandments.
This is not a salvation issue. This is how God instructs us how to be His people.
If we miss that, we miss important details, like the meaning of:
“All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16)
“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. (John 14:15)
THIS IS WHERE GRACE COMES IN.
The commandments, at least 10 of which were written on stone, are to be written on our hearts just as God wanted in Deuteronomy 5.
When you ask Jesus to come into your life, and receive the Holy Spirit, this is what you are asking for:
Jeremiah 31:
31 “Behold, days are coming,” declares Yahweh, “when I will cut a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, 32 not like the covenant which I cut with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, but I was a husband to them,” declares Yahweh. 33 “But this is the covenant which I will cut with the house of Israel after those days,” declares Yahweh: “I will put My law within them, and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
Ezekiel 36:
26 Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to do My judgments.
This is why Salvation is a gift. Maybe this helps you see why we are saved by grace through faith. God calls us to follow AND gives us the means to do it.
We get rescued out of slavery to sin, and its consequence, death. We have a Savior King. We have a People we become a part of (grafted into Israel. more on that later.). We get to join our King (God in the flesh), in His coming Kingdom. And to prepare us for that coming Promise, He gives us His Spirit to protect, guide, keep and prepare us like a Bride gets dressed and ready for her wedding day. The commandments which acted as a guardian until Jesus arrived (Galatians 3:24), are now being written on our hearts. THIS is how God transforms us.
In the days ahead, let’s continue seeing what other movie details we’re missing.