Wednesday, November 09, 2011
I Have Decided To Follow Jesus
Josephine Vivaldo interviews Kyle Idleman
The reason, I think, is because we have not discovered for ourselves what it really means to become deeply committed to Christ.
So, have you decided to follow Jesus or are you just a fan?
“We have all kinds of funny ways to measure our relationship with God and have things that we point to as evidence, like the fact that there is a fish on our bumper or people will talk about the fact that their grandparents went to church or that they have four Bibles in their house.”There are a lot of ways to talk about this problem and fan v follower is a good one. Professing Christianity without experiencing the transforming power is how I would tend to put it. It is in many ways the great issue facing the church. We have no problem getting people to say "yes" to Jesus, but getting them to commit to becoming different people, well that's another story altogether.
Idleman, a preacher’s son himself, shared that when he was young he fit the description of a fan. He wore the t-shirt saying “this blood is for you,” and next to a poster of Michael Jordan he had a picture of Jesus. “I wanted to be like Jesus but I wanted to be like Mike,” he said in a video.
While working on a message to preach to 30,000 attendees at Southern Christian Church, he realized the celebrity-driven fan culture is permeating Christianity. But “Jesus doesn’t want fans, he wants completely committed followers.” Since then, what began as a sermon evolved into a movement that got people evaluating their relationship with Jesus.
The reason, I think, is because we have not discovered for ourselves what it really means to become deeply committed to Christ.
So, have you decided to follow Jesus or are you just a fan?
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