Live Free with Josh Howerton - Jesus Calls Those He Desires | Ep. 426 | Monday, September 23, 2024

Episode Date: September 23, 2024

God wants to be known and be known by you. He desires to have a personal relationship and quality time together. Jesus first called his disciples to be in His presence rather than focusing on outward actions or changing the world. To remain in Jesus is to align your life so that everything moves toward more intimacy with God. For more information, visit lakepointe.church/dailydrive

Thanks for tuning in to today's Daily Drive with Lake Point Church, a daily dose of God's word for your morning drive. When the word, not the world, becomes the majority of your week, your life will start to change. For that reason, our prayer is that God will speak to you through today's devotional. For more digital content to feed your faith, visit lakepoint.comit. And now let's dive in to today's devotional. Well, hey guys, welcome to our daily drive. If we haven't met, my name is Carlos, and I get to be a part of the pastoral team here at Lake Point.

And today we get to hang out. And this week as well for a few minutes every day as we dive into the Word of God. And in this season, I believe that what we need more than anything as a church is is a deeper understanding of who God is and a deeper experience of his presence and his power and his promises in Scripture. And for that reason, this week, we're going, deeper on one particular aspect of our lives and our relationship with Jesus. And so today, we will start by going deeper in our intimacy with God. So let's hear from the words of Jesus from

John chapter 15 verse 5. Jesus says this. He says, I am the vine and you are the branches. If you remain in me and I and you, you will bear much fruit. Now apart from me, you can do nothing. Hey, some years ago, I decided I was going to become a runner. Now, the reason I wanted to do that is because I wanted to invest more time in working on my cardio. And honestly, just running felt like the next best choice. Now, I figured that if I was going to run more, I need a way to keep track of my steps. My heart rate and the distance that I'd run and all those things. So I had a very important decision to make.

And I was told I could either get a Fitbit tracker or an Apple Watch. Now, what I did is what every normal person does when facing these quote-unquote very important decisions. I googled Fitbit versus Apple Watch and read all the articles and checked out all the YouTube videos. And some people said, oh my gosh, Fitbit is so much better. It's cheaper. It's simpler. It's cooler. And then other people said, no, no, no.

Apple Watch is way better. It's got way more features. You can get text messages and you can make calls. You can even microwave your breakfast there as well. You can do so many different things. and by the way, I'm kidding about the microwave in your breakfast, obviously. But clearly Apple Watch had so much more

I could do with it. Long story short, and this was years ago, I decided to go with Dermilis, and it's obviously if you're watching on YouTube, I went with Fitbit. Now, I'm probably in the minority of opinion here, and I'm sure right now all of my Apple Watch friends are like, wrong decision.

Apple Watch is obviously amazing, and, you know, it's funny. I've actually never met somebody that owns an Apple Watch that doesn't love owning one. So maybe I did make the wrong decision. But let me tell you what was one of the main things that stopped me from getting an Apple Watch back in the day. It was the fact that generally speaking,

if I'm not mistaken to this day, Apple still recommends charging your Apple Watch every day for 60 to 90 minutes. Now, a Fitbit, on the other hand, you only need to charge it once every six to seven days. So if you give me the option, would you rather charge your watch every single day? Or just once a week, I'd probably go with once a week. And here's why, because I'd want to do whatever is more convenient, whatever is easiest, and whatever takes away the least amount of my time.

And I start sharing this because, honestly, that's what happens sometimes with our relationship with Jesus. we know God is calling us to a deeper intimacy with him. But if we're honest, if we could just get by with pursuing that intimacy with God only once a week or maybe even a couple times a week when we go to church or meet with our group or just once in a while, we'd probably be okay with that. And in some cases, we might even actually prefer that. But Jesus didn't call his disciples to that. He said, instead, listen, I want you to remain in me.

In other words, you could say Jesus calls us to pursue him more like an Apple Watch than a Fitbit. It's an everyday thing, not just a once in a while thing. In other words, to remain in Jesus is to align your life so that every day, everything moves in a direction of more intimacy towards God. Listen to what Mark chapter 3, verse 13 to 14 says, happened when Jesus called the first disciples. Verse 13 says, and Jesus went up on the mountain and called to him those whom he desired. Check out that language. And they came to him. And he appointed 12 whom he also named apostles so that they might be with him and he might send them out to preach.

first notice that Mark says Jesus called those who he desired friend you need to know this God is not after your forced obedience he is after you the Bible says God is like a lover who deeply desires to know and be known by you so that's why this text says Jesus calls whom he desires and then if you pay attention in verse 14 it says Jesus calls the first 12 disciples it says literally Jesus calls them to be with him, and then he sends them out to preach. Jesus' original call to his disciples was not to go and change the world. It was to simply be with Jesus. Before God calls you to do something for him, he calls you to be with him.

And when Jesus invites us to abide in him, to remain in him, to deepen our intentions. intimacy with him. He says in John 15 that the result will be that you and I will bear much fruit. Now, check this out. Everything Jesus decides to do through your life, he will do so out of the overflow of your intimacy with him. And so if your primary identity and relationship and life is that of a follower of Jesus and he calls you first and foremost to be with him, my question for you today is how can you prioritize your daily schedule to make that a reality? How can we arrange our habits to start and end our days in prayer and in scripture? How can I surrender my time, my mind, my thoughts, my activities to God so that he guides us

towards a deeper intimacy with him? And are we filling our minds with more of His Word and less of the world? Your relationship with God and your life in Christ in general will grow and mature to the extent of your intimacy with Him as you remain in Him. Hey, the rest of this week we'll continue to go deeper in our relationship with God. So don't miss tomorrow's episode. We'll see you then. Thanks for tuning in today. For more biblical teaching and worship, join us for our church online live weekend services on Saturday.

and Sundays. For more information about all the digital ministries of Lake Point, visit lakepoint.church slash daily drive. Also, if this podcast was helpful to you, would you be sure to rate, review, and share this podcast to help get the word out.