JUST ONE THING HOLDING YOU BACK

Life is so short. Wouldn’t it be a tragedy to approach the end of your life and realize you had missed life’s main purpose? Your years of diligent endeavors, feverish work schedules, hectic balancing acts to manage those competing demands and the skill with which you spun those multiple plates in the air – all that skill, brain power, energy and commitment evaporating like a wispy vapor before your eyes. And there you lie, wondering if you missed the boat in life. Too late to put the brakes on then and slam it into reverse. There is no reverse in life. You can’t back-up and recover lost time.  The radical changes you thought of making in your life when the Lord spoke to your heart over the years – but then got buried in the real important debris of business and success – now come back to you again – but this time not as wistful possibilities but rather impossibilities wrapped in dark regret – borderline remorse.

As you read this, your mind is already racing. “Really, what is holding me back spiritually? What is keeping me from realizing my full potential for the Lord and following the path He has purposed for my life?” Oh, like Martha, you may be worried, bothered and anxious about many things – legitimate things (Luke 10:41); but then one things keeps rising to the surface of your thoughts.  What is that one thing you try to deny is the real thing that is holding you back? You acknowledge it exists but you try to explain it away. The mental gymnastics are tiring as you try so hard to convince yourself that it is just one of many things but not the primary culprit. But yet, it really is!

So many years ago, a rich young man ran down the road kicking up the dust as he rushed to see Jesus. He had many things in life and it seemed that if he could obtain eternal life, it would be the icing on his cake of life. With discernment that only God Himself has, Jesus saw through all the layers of that man’s thinking. He didn’t immediately touch the core issue but He worked the man through a process of peeling back the layers of the onion of his life. Things seemed to be going reasonably well and perhaps the young man was hopeful. But there was one more layer to peel away and here is how the rest of the story goes:

Then Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him,

“One thing you lack:

Go your way, sell whatever you have and give to the poor,

and you will have treasure in heaven;

and come, take up the cross, and follow Me.”

But he was sad at this word, and went away sorrowful,

for he had great possessions.

(Mark 10:21-22)

What was the young man’s one thing that held him back from following Jesus and discipleship? His one thing was things.

There are two dreadful things in life, the painful bleakness and regret of which can only be truly measured by those experiencing it. The first one is to approach death knowing you have missed accepting Christ as your Saviour. The second most regretful experience must be to approach death knowing you have missed following Christ as your Lord.

Is the Lord speaking to you just now about that one thing in your life that has a growing grip on you and is actually controlling you and holding you back from following the Lord fully?

Walk carefully and closely with the Lord today,

Warmly in Christ

Peter Ramsay