Saturday July 31st - Follow my leader
Today's reflections are by Paul Harcourt
On the day you read these notes, my family, like many others, will be preparing to return from a Christian summer conference (in our case, New Wine). I’m sure that like every year, it will have been a week of great worship and inspiring teaching. No doubt we will be enthusiastically telling others at home about what various speakers said. The mark of a great talk though is always whether people come away praising Jesus or the speaker. Ultimately we follow God rather than any human personality.
As Paul makes abundantly clear, it’s all about Him. Paul knew it was God himself who had set him apart, called him and revealed Jesus to him (vv 15-16). By not going immediately to see the apostles after his conversion, he wasn’t being arrogantly independent - he was simply following God’s plan for his own life, which meant first drawing aside into obscurity (v 17).
When the Lord released him into ministry later, only then did he meet the apostles. Right from the start, Paul lived out his calling to follow Christ above all. We all have heroes, but they may let us down; we all have Christian friends, but some sadly might over the years lose their faith. Either of those things would be a tragedy but we must not allow them to shake our own faith. Whatever happens, we must always follow Jesus.
Jesus, You are the “Author and Perfecter” of my faith (Hebrews 12:2). Let me look to You alone. Amen