The Weight of Responsibility
The call to follow Jesus carries responsibilities and expectations.
A few years ago I sat down to have one final conversation with my pastor before leaving our church.
I had just accepted an offer to be a college minister at a church in North Carolina and I wanted to make sure I had one last 1-on-1 conversation with the guy that I had sat under every Sunday for half a decade.
I was encouraged, challenged, and given all types of instruction over the course of that meeting but there is one specific statement that stands out as most impactful.
“Brandon, you are the only one who will be able to lead that ministry. No one is going to do it for you.”
As my pastor, I’m sure he knew my tendency to let others lead for me. Even if he didn’t, those words carried weight with me.
So much so that I still remember them today when the need for a difficult decision comes up or when it’s clear there’s a lack of vision and direction in our ministry and something needs to change.
No one else is going to do it for me.
That type of language overflows with the weight of responsibility. It implies that if I’m going to lead the ministry God has given me, it will require me to take full responsibility for that ministry.
And you know what that’s like, don’t you?
You may not be in vocational ministry but it’s the same in your job, or your family, or your home. You know, no one else is going to get your work done, love your spouse, parent your children, be kind to your siblings, clean your house, do your laundry, etc. etc. If it’s going to happen, it’s going to be because you do it.
As weighty as all that is, there’s also a sense of freedom in it. When we see all the flaws in our life — personal or professional — as our responsibility to correct, we are free to fix those problems. We move away from excuses & waiting for others to fix it and we move toward doing the work necessary to correct the flaws and shortcomings. If, deep down, we believe they are someone else’s problem to fix, we’ll never fix them and thus, remain drenched in our flaws and problems. Jackie has been a major, major help to me with this.
This type of mindset is why people are successful.
The most successful athletes are relentlessly correcting their weaknesses. LeBron James is a better 3pt shooter in year 21 than he’s ever been. Which is significant because when he came into the league that was the skill everyone pointed out as his flaw.
The most successful teachers are constantly improving their communication skills and teaching style to meet the needs of their students.
The most successful business people are addicted to finding the most efficient and effective processes for their company.
Why?
Because they’ve taken responsibility for the task in front of them. LeBron knows if he’s going to be a great shooter it’s going to be because he has put in the necessary work.
Every single bit of this is true for our walk with Jesus.
If we are going to grow spiritually, it’s going to be because we’ve taken the responsibility to do whatever it takes to grow spiritually and correct our flaws.
No one is going to read the Bible for us.
No one is going to talk to God for us.
No one is going to confess sin for us.
No one is going to fast for us.
No one is going to repent for us.
No one is going to be obedient for us.
No one is going to believe promises for us.
If it’s going to happen, it’s because we’ve taken the responsibility to do it ourselves.
Sure, you may be in a great community of Christian’s that pray for you, send you scripture, encourage you, fast on your behalf, and hold you accountable.
But if you are being a passive participant of people doing all of this on your behalf, but not actively participating in your own growth, you will never experience the fullness of what God has for you.
It’s through the active pursuit of God that we experience his love, sense the leading of the Holy Spirit and know the goodness of what it means to be obedient in hard times.
Consider this…
When Jesus called his disciples to follow him, what happened there?
The disciples left behind everything they knew to be a follower of Rabbi Jesus. The expectation for them as followers of their Rabbi would be that they applied every single thing He taught to their lives.
Seriously, every single word and teaching that Jesus gave, they were expected to follow to a T.
This means two really important things…
They weren’t picking and choosing what they wanted to apply to their lives and what they did not want to apply.
Sometimes in our modern culture, it’s tempting to treat Jesus‘s teaching, and the Bible as a whole, kinda like a buffet line. Will take the stuff that we agree with and like, but we will leave behind the stuff that we don’t agree with and is too inconvenient for us at the time. This is far from what the disciples were doing.
Not only that, it also meant that the disciples were constantly trying to be around Jesus as much as possible so they could hear everything that he said.
Well, many of us probably don’t have too much of a problem with the first category, this is where we might find ourselves. We simply do not know what our Rabbi Jesus wants us to do because we spend little time with Him.
It’s important to remember that when we trust Jesus for salvation we aren’t just “saved” or “a Christian now” — we are disciples of the Rabbi Jesus. And like the disciples that Jesus called 2000 years ago we also are expected to leave behind everything and bank our life on his every single word.
Which means that we can’t pick and choose what we want to hear what we don’t want to hear. And it means that we need to spend as much time with Him as possible to hear His every word. We’re expected to match our lives to His.
These type of expectation means one very important thing. We have a responsibility to do whatever it takes to follow Jesus.
If there’s a flaw in our relationship with Jesus, it’s our responsibility to work on that.
If there’s a flaw and how we present Jesus to the world, it’s our responsibility to work on that.
If there’s a flaw in our ability to share Jesus with the world, it’s our responsibility to work on that.
If there’s a flaw in our lives that we see based off something in God’s word, it’s our responsibility to conform our life to His word.
This is true every time, all the time.
Responsibilities like this carry weight. It’s easy to almost feel overwhelmed by talking about following Jesus like this because of how many commandments we see in the scripture.
But what does Jesus say?
My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
How can He say that?
Because at the same time, he command us to follow him and leave behind everything else, he has also given us the Holy Spirit that enables us to do so.
He has promised His presence to help us be obedient (Ezekiel 36:26-27) and He follows through on that promise day in and day out.
God has done everything necessary for us to follow him and obey him. Now, we have the responsibility to follow and obey like our lives depend on it — because they do.
See you next Wednesday
Great reminders here!
i really like this post and its a great reminder. i think prudence also tells us we need friendship and accountability to balance and support responsibility as well. thanks for sharing!