“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.. -Luke 14:26-27 ESV

Warrior;

Jesus is BOTH the LAMB OF GOD, AND the LION OF THE TRIBE OF JUDAH! He is BOTH fully man, and FULLY GOD!  There is no other like HIM! It is written: For Jesus is the one referred to in the Scriptures, where it says, ‘The stone that you builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:11-12) The authority of the name of Jesus causes every knee to bow in reverence! Everything and everyone will one day submit to this name—in the heavenly realm, in the earthly realm, and in the demonic realm. And every tongue will proclaim in every language: “Jesus Christ is Lord Yahweh,” bringing glory and honor to God, his Father! “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Romans 10:13). Jesus is our CREATOR and He is our JUDGE, He is LORD, He is MASTER, He is SAVIOR, He is REDEEMER, He is our HOPE, He is the REASON for EVERY SEASON, He is MORE THAN ENOUGH, He is everything.  Where we place JESUS on your ‘relational hierarchy’ MATTERS!  We are to have NOTHING ELSE above our LOVE and DESIRE for JESUS! This love/desire can be demonstrated by our FAITH, and our willingness to forsake all others, and other things!  The depth of our love\desire can be measured by what we are willing to walk away from, or relegate below, getting to know Jesus, and having others know Jesus. Hear the Word of the Lord; “But I have this [charge] against you, that you have left your first love [you have lost the depth of love that you first had for Me]. So remember the heights from which you have fallen, and repent [change your inner self–your old way of thinking, your sinful behavior–seek God’s will] and do the works you did at first [when you first knew Me]; otherwise, I will visit you and remove your lampstand (the church, its impact) from its place–unless you repent.(Revelation 2:4-5)

Leader, Hebrews 11:6 reminds us that without faith it is impossible to Please God. Faith shows up in many ways, and one of the ways is in listening and obeying the commands of God. The Word Faith comes from the Hebrew word, ‘Pisteos, or Pistin’, it means: Faith, belief, trust, confidence, fidelity. Faith, and Belief in Hebrew, like many other Hebrew words mean ACTION, it is not just a feeling or a thought. It is NO OTHER OPTION, your only hope, like you’re on the ocean and you have something to “cling onto’ so you don’t drown. Many people only get half the gospel, they only want the Jesus of His first coming, the soft, fluffy, Lamb of God. The one that turned the other cheek and allowed Himself to be stripped bare to the bones, and bled out- that Jesus already came. When Jesus comes back for ACT 2, He will come as the LION from the tribe of JUDAH! Under a section in the Bible labeled, ‘Not Peace, but a Sword’, it is written: “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) Too many people are comfortably off-course. Many who call themselves believers have God as part of their life, but NOT the CENTRAL FOCUS of their life. Many people are not desperate enough. As the song says, “I’m just a nobody, wanting to tell everybody, about somebody, who saved my soul”. Have you crossed over to dependence on God? You can’t get to the town called DEPENDENCE, until you take the road of DESPERATION. IN God’s overwhelming love He would rather you experience great pain on this planet and FIND HIM, then have a peaceful, fun life on this planet and never seek Him, because you never NEEDED HIM!

Conduit, this brings us back to Mark 5 and the 3 miracles that our Messiah did. He cast out LEGION from the man at the Gadarenes, He healed the woman with blood, and He raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead. Each one of these lives was forever changed. Each one of these three people NEVER WENT BACK to their old lives, EVERYTHING CHANGED with JESUS! The man at the tombs was in bad shape. He was set free, He was a new creature in Christ Jesus-see 1 Cor 5:17. “And they came to Jesus and saw the demon-possessed man, the one who had had the legion, sitting there, clothed and in his right mind, and they were afraid”. They knew this man and he was changed, and it freaked them out how well put together this man was. The man wanted to stay with Jesus, but Jesus told him that instead of going with Jesus now, Jesus had a mission for him. “Go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.” And scripture says, “And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marveled.” We know this man fulfilled his mission because in the next chapter when Jesus returned it says, “the people immediately recognized him and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they heard he was. (Mark 6:53-56) Consider Jairus, he was a temple leader, ready to kill Jesus in Mark 3, but now just 2 chapters later, he is losing his daughter and realizes the only hope he has is Jesus. Have you ever been there, that Jesus is your only hope? After reaching out to Jesus to REVIVE his daughter Jairus was most likely kicked out of the synagogue. And consider the woman with the blood issue. For 12 years isolated, alone, no life, no money, no hope, no Savior- she was dirty and broke. Now she is a NEW CREATURE in JESUS. She is now alive and going around telling others about the HOPE SHE HAS…” Go, your faith has made you whole”! Her desperation built this great Faith that brought healing! Have you gotten to the place where you are ready to remove all others from your throne and put Jesus in His rightful place? Or are you going to be like the rich young ruler in Mark 10:17-27? The man’s face clouded over. This was the last thing he expected to hear, and he walked off with a heavy heart. He was holding on tight to a lot of things, and not about to let go. Let GO of the WORLD, and GRAB hold of The WORD!