Follow Me: Why Follow the Lord

By Matthew Kaye

This book is about following Christ. My earlier book, Come to Me, Why Come to the Lord, explained the importance of coming to the Lord. But coming is only a first step. We need to follow, as Jesus commanded us to do—both as believers and as examples to others to become believers. It is in the believing that we are empowered by Christ to “overcome” the toils of this world and become heirs to his. And this is the Lord’s gift to us: that in following him, all things become possible, even seeing past our own daily problems to the kingdom that he prepared for us “from the foundation of the world.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781638142454

Book preview

cover.jpg

Follow Me

Why Follow the Lord

Matthew Kaye

ISBN 978-1-63814-244-7 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-63814-245-4 (Digital)

Copyright © 2021 Matthew Kaye

All rights reserved

First Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Covenant Books, Inc.

11661 Hwy 707

Murrells Inlet, SC 29576

www.covenantbooks.com

Table of Contents

The Light

The Love

The Power of Love

Thy Neighbor

Thine Enemy

The Narrow Gate

The Deliverer

The Walk

The Holy Spirit

The Dwelling Place

Not Alone

God’s Armor

God’s Blessing

God’s Mercy and Forgiveness

Our Need for Him

We Are His

He Is Ours

The Soul

The Devil

A Savior

Final Victory

For my loving wife, Tamara, who has always been an inspiration to me in reading and understanding the Lord’s Word, and for my children, David and Evie

Preface

The Lord Jesus Christ told those who would listen to him, Come to me and I will give you rest, a spiritual rest from and forgiveness for sin. But he also told those who could understand his truth, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.

Jesus’s invitation to follow him still lives with us to this day. Words of truth, power, and love are his.

Love your enemies. (Matthew 5:44 NIV)

Pray for those who persecute you. (Matthew 5:44 NIV)

Do to others what you would have them do to you. (Matthew 7:12 NIV)

These were the words of the Lord, the words of the suffering servant, sent by God to save a sinful and depraved human race. But they were more than that. Christ promised his followers salvation, eternal life in God’s kingdom, and the power to lead others to the truth, to be fishers of men, capable of spreading the gospel.

The Lord’s words are recounted throughout this book in a series of themes, expounding on Jesus’s many lessons and commands. It is an effort to illuminate his inspiring and powerful message to follow me. The words of Christ were words of perfection, words that could only originate with the Lord, with God, providing a road map to free us from the bondage of sin and sanctify us with Jesus’s robe of righteousness. And once freed, it will enable us to free others.

The Christian faith is more than simply a coming to the Lord through a faith that even he gives us. It is a faith that brings us into Christ’s kingdom where life is eternal, one that guides us to greater and greater perfection. It’s a faith that empowers us and inspires us to lead others to this kingdom. Jesus was not about saving just a handful of followers but about transforming nations of believers.

He instructed his disciples in Mark 16:15–16 NIV: Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. The Lord’s admonition to his followers was to be perfect, as your Father in Heaven is perfect (Matthew 5:48). We become Children of God as we take up Christ’s cross, die to our sins, are resurrected with him into a new life, and follow the Lord. God wants to redeem us, wants to set us on right paths, and like his Son, wants us to be holy, as an example to others.

We read in Matthew 16:24 NIV: Then Jesus told His disciples, ‘If anyone wants to come with Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me.’ It is a purification. We must take up our cross, die to our sins, as the Apostle Paul also taught, and join the Lord. Through this dying to our sins, we are purified. By dying to ourselves, to our very nature, we become greater than ourselves, able to inspire and lead others. We rise above the world—a world corrupted by sin and the gratification of sin and a world without moral basis, without God. It is a world that needs purification and that needs the gospel message of salvation because it is only through this message that the world can be saved.

The Lord Jesus Christ told the Roman procurator Pontius Pilate (John 18:36 NIV) who had Jesus crucified, My kingdom is not of this world. Christ came into this world not to condemn it but to save it through his sacrifice, his death, in our place on that cross. And through Christ, we also die to ourselves, our sinful selves. We become what God intended for us before the fall of man, the death of the first Adam. We become more perfect, as our Father meant for us to be, and with this transformation, we become more able to teach and lead others to follow the Lord.

This book is about following Christ. My earlier book Come to Me, Why Come to the Lord explained the importance of coming to the Lord. But coming is only a first step. We need to follow, as Jesus commanded us to do—both as believers and as examples to others to become believers—for it is in the believing that we are empowered by Christ to overcome the toils of this world and become heirs to his. And this is the Lord’s gift to us: that in following him, all things become possible, even seeing past our mundane daily problems to the kingdom that he prepared for us.

Jesus says in John 14:15–16 BSB, If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate to be with you forever. There is no doubt that Jesus intended to empower his followers to be his and to lead others to follow him.

We are brought to the Lord by faith, given to us through the Holy Spirit. And through this faith, we receive God’s forgiving grace (Ephesians 2:8–10). The righteousness of the Lord is imputed to us by his sacrifice on the cross—the ransom for our sins. Our sins are expunged, our slate wiped clean. It is the good news, the gospel message of Christ that, through him, we are saved from our just punishment. And once saved, we are moved by the Holy Spirit to strive to become more like Christ, more perfect, he said, as his Father in Heaven is perfect. And the world sees through us the Lord’s glory, and by this expression is helped to see his truth. The Lord’s advocate, the Holy Spirit, works in us and others to make us more like Christ. It is a power like no other, God-given, God-delivered, from a corner of spiritual existence that has no beginning, no end, reflected in the brilliant, blinding light of Christ’s glory.

It is in the following of the Lord that we, more fully, take on the righteousness of Christ and become the Children of God and heirs to the kingdom of heaven created for us before the foundation of the world, as the Lord told his followers some twenty centuries ago.

He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like