Fully Devoted: No Shortcuts in Following Jesus

Verses

Proverbs 21:30 (NIV) 

30There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord. 

When I was a young boy, I always thought I was clever, seemingly able to fool my parents around every turn. One time, when eating my least favorite food, pork chops, my parents were trying to convince me to join the clean plate club. There was no reward for joining, it was just a creative attempt for me to finish my food. Anyway, I had an idea to just store the last remnants of pork chop in both sides of my cheeks, fully thinking I could skirt swallowing the tough white meat. Excused from the table, I made my way upstairs to take a bath before bed and I spit out the chewed-up pork chop in the garbage can. As I settled into the warm water tasting victory and not pork chop a smile came across my face. I won. The moment I began relishing this, my mom came upstairs with a fresh pork chop ready for me to eat.  

I’ve always been one to spot a great shortcut, whether driving or in life. Shortcuts encompass insights into a situation using wise thinking to develop a plan for ultimate success at achieving something in an easier and quicker way. As we age, shortcuts can become second nature, especially little shortcuts that no one knows about. Life is hard enough as it is, and shortcuts provide us with a well-deserved break from the arduousness that is adulthood. Sadly, there are no shortcuts to pleasing our Father. Following in Jesus’ footsteps requires an inside-out transformation; the hardest thing I’ve ever done next to parenting.  

There are no shortcuts to forming and maintaining a relationship with anyone, especially Jesus. Would you want a person coming into your life with the quiet idea that they are going to shortcut their way into becoming your friend? Seems rather shallow in my own opinion, and I wouldn’t want to maintain a relationship with a person like that. Time is a precious human commodity and the time we give others should be just as fruitful as the time given to us by them. The same holds true with Jesus, His Spirit in us and the Father. He is the Creator, the Alpha and Omega and knows ALL things. No plan or wisdom exists to shortcut your way to His grace and mercy, it’s done by relationships, requiring dedication, pruning, vulnerability and humility. The next time you find yourself forming a plan through justification to shortcut a relationship, Holy or otherwise, move instead to sanctification, and turn the tables around onto yourself. You may find some extra effort deep down that wasn’t there before.

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Eric Bucher