MCLEODS, New Brunswick, January 13, 2024 – Jesus didn’t spend his ministry looking for people who didn’t believe in God and trying to get them to believe. That wasn’t his aim or purpose. Jesus spent his ministry inviting people who already believed to commit to the highest level of belief that encompassed every aspect of their lives.

What he essentially did was to invite people to take God seriously.

As followers of Jesus, we should not only be taking God seriously but aiming to get others to take him seriously, too. We do this not by threatening them (as some religions do) but by reminding them of Jesus’ teachings.

What does it look like when you take God seriously?

First and foremost, you totally and willingly submit to God. You don’t submit 50% or 75% or even 99% – you submit 100%. When you take God seriously, you take him at his Word, which means you keep his Commandments, the first of which is to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. You don’t love God just a little bit or when it’s convenient for you, or just on Sundays for an hour during church service. You love him 24/7. You fall asleep thinking about God, you wake up thinking about God, and he’s on your mind all day long. God and Jesus are your constant companions, through God’s Holy Spirit that you received at your rebirth, and you do nothing without their prompting. Jesus said he only did what the Father showed him to do and only what pleased the Father. Jesus didn’t dream up this or that scheme and then run it by God for his approval; he waited for God to show him what to do. We’re to do the same.

When you take God seriously, you understand that he means business. Yes, God is loving and merciful, but he’s also just, which means he dictates and approves vengeance. The God of the Old Testament is the God of the New Testament. They are not different gods, as some would have you believe. The God who incinerated two of Aaron’s sons for burning incense to demons and then forbid Aaron to mourn them is the same God who lovingly called down from Heaven that Jesus is his son and we should listen to him. The same God who directed the children of Israel, under Joshua, to stone Achan and all his family to death and then to burn their corpses and heap rocks on their remains is the same God who sent his Holy Spirit to baptize the disciples at Pentecost. The same God who utterly and without remorse destroyed Sodom is the same God who lovingly nurtured John the Baptist in the wilderness.

What this means is that unless we want to end up like Aaron’s sons or Achan and his family or the people of Sodom, we need to take God seriously and thoroughly understand that he means business. It’s not enough to say that “God loves me” and “God is merciful” and “Jesus died for our sins so I’m covered” and then go on our merry way, living the life of the world. The hypocrites, as Jesus pointed out, thought that being children of Abraham was their spiritual covering and automatic ticket to Heaven, but they were dead wrong. We’re also dead wrong if we think that being followers of Jesus is our spiritual covering and automatic ticket to Heaven or that “pleading the blood of Jesus” is going to be a sufficient defense on Judgement Day.

Trust me – the last thing you’ll want to find out at the Judgement is that you are indeed judged on your every word, thought, and deed, just like Jesus warned us we would be. The devil is working overtime to get you to believe that’s not the case, that all you need is “faith” and to throw a little charity here and there and you’re good to go. The devil would have you believe that the Commandments are old school and optional, and that all that matters is “love”. He’s fooled a lot of people in that regard. I hope you’re not one of them.

When you take God seriously, your life looks nothing like the life of the world. You understand that, like Jesus, your time is short and you’re here only to do what God sends you to do. You don’t make long-term plans or any plans at all: You’re entirely in God’s hands. Also like Jesus, you don’t marry or have romantic relationships but instead become a eunuch for the Kingdom of Heaven’s sake. That doesn’t mean you cut off your genitals; it means you live as if you don’t have any. If you’re married, you leave your spouse. You don’t divorce, you separate. A spouse will only take your focus off God. So will children. You live celibately and without ties, attachments, or dependents. You don’t have a mortgage and you don’t have credit cards. You don’t take out loans. You owe nothing to anyone. You don’t own a house or land. If you have a job, you don’t have a boss. You work just enough to earn your daily bread and with the understanding that you might have to stop working from one day to the next. Your job is not your priority; your family is not your priority; your possessions are not your priority: God is your priority.

When you take God seriously, nothing written here shocks you or unsettles you. You agree with every word and see yourself reflected not in the hypocrites or in Achan and his family, but in Jesus. When you take God seriously, you respond with enthusiasm to his invitation to take your commitment to the highest level and you send God your RSVP right away; you don’t make excuses as to why you can’t or won’t: You simply do it.

When you take God seriously, spending all day, every day, with him and Jesus is not an obligation or an imposition: It’s pure pleasure. It’s life itself, outside which there is no life.

When you take God seriously, you do the right thing for no other reason than it is the right thing. You treat everyone as you would want to be treated, no exceptions. And if you fall short of these aims (and you will, we all do; only Jesus didn’t) – if you fall short, you make your amends and you keep going. You don’t wallow in self-pity or self-loathing; you don’t tear out your hair and berate yourself publicly or privately; you don’t make excuses or point fingers of blame: you make your amends and you keep going.

When you take God seriously, your life is blessed morning, noon, and night, wherever you are and wherever you go. You’re the happiest creature on Earth, when you take God seriously.