Jesus Comes First
Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth.
I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.
And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,
and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it,
and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
-- Matthew 10.34-39
Have you ever thought back over your life about the things that have molded you, that have molded your thinking and your life direction and have made you who and what you are?
Though I didn’t officially learn or memorize the passage above in my childhood, I absorbed it as a guiding principle of life from my earliest days.
The atmosphere in my childhood home was that right is right and wrong is wrong. If your friends are doing wrong, you must stand on the side of truth, even if your friends laugh at you, mock you, or hate you. Being rightly related to God’s truth supersedes all human relationships.
That goes for family as well. If a family member is doing wrong, you don’t side with or protect them merely because they are family. You side with God’s truth and with what is right. If that creates a breach with a family relationship, so be it.
Jesus said He comes first. If we follow Him, we are called to do this – no matter how hard or uncomfortable it is to us.
This important principle has operated in my socialization from elementary school days on.
Some people think it has a cultish flavor, because nothing, they say, is more important than family. Oddly enough, I have found that many of these people don’t really believe that – because if you want to follow the world’s values in opposition to Christ, and your Christian family opposes you, these same people will tell you how to abandon your family and instead “follow your heart” and find other people who agree with you and are willing to be “family” to you.
Which is the same thing in principle that Jesus commanded His followers.
It’s just a question of which God you choose to serve.
I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.
And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,
and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it,
and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
-- Matthew 10.34-39
Have you ever thought back over your life about the things that have molded you, that have molded your thinking and your life direction and have made you who and what you are?
Though I didn’t officially learn or memorize the passage above in my childhood, I absorbed it as a guiding principle of life from my earliest days.
The atmosphere in my childhood home was that right is right and wrong is wrong. If your friends are doing wrong, you must stand on the side of truth, even if your friends laugh at you, mock you, or hate you. Being rightly related to God’s truth supersedes all human relationships.
That goes for family as well. If a family member is doing wrong, you don’t side with or protect them merely because they are family. You side with God’s truth and with what is right. If that creates a breach with a family relationship, so be it.
Jesus said He comes first. If we follow Him, we are called to do this – no matter how hard or uncomfortable it is to us.
This important principle has operated in my socialization from elementary school days on.
Some people think it has a cultish flavor, because nothing, they say, is more important than family. Oddly enough, I have found that many of these people don’t really believe that – because if you want to follow the world’s values in opposition to Christ, and your Christian family opposes you, these same people will tell you how to abandon your family and instead “follow your heart” and find other people who agree with you and are willing to be “family” to you.
Which is the same thing in principle that Jesus commanded His followers.
It’s just a question of which God you choose to serve.