“Follow Me”
– Jesus
An open letter to those who would be His disciples.
March 25, 2020 (New Moon)
When I was 17, I started reading the New Testament seriously for the first time and the one thing that stood out to me the most was that following Jesus was not a weekend religion – it required whole-hearted, zealous devotion. I started with the Gospel of Matthew and, after plowing through the genealogy and reading what I thought was the oh so familiar nativity story, I came to John the Baptist. He was clearly a radical sort of guy who drew the line in the sand. But when he introduced Jesus, he made Jesus sound even more polarizing. This is what he said:
“His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” – Matthew 3:12 (NASB)
Admittedly, when I was 17, I didn’t really get the image described here; but it sure looked like whatever Jesus was going to do, it was going to result in some people being gathered together with Him, and those who wouldn’t be gathered were not going to be saved.
Then, I came to the description of Jesus calling His first disciples. All He said to these fishermen was “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” (Matt. 4:19) And they dropped everything (!) and followed Him! As I kept reading, it became more and more clear that Jesus’ disciples were not living ordinary lives; they didn’t do business as usual, only making a profession that they believe in Jesus, going to church once a week, maybe having a bible study every once in a while. No, they were supposed to hunger and thirst for righteousness (Matt. 5:5) and they were supposed to stand out like a light on a hill (Matt. 5:14). Following Jesus was expected to make them objects of ridicule and persecution (Matt. 5:10-12). It was obvious to me, even then, that to follow Jesus was a full-time thing that you wore on your sleeve. You were to be an ambassador for Him and His Kingdom. Everyone around me who went through life living as most people do, with Jesus in the background, was not following Jesus how His first disciples were expected to follow Him.
I could go on and on relating the sorts of things I read in the New Testament about how “no one can serve two masters” (Matt. 6:24) and how we are to “seek first” God’s “kingdom and His righteousness” even more than our basic necessities (Matt. 6:25-33), and how there are only two ways, one to death and one to life, and few find the way to life (Matt. 7:13-14). To be a follower of Jesus, you had to be willing to go without a pillow (Matt. 8:19-20), and you couldn’t let anything delay you from following Him, even duties to your family (Matt. 8:21-22; 10:34-37). To be a follower of Jesus was downright hardcore; you had to even be willing to die; as Jesus said, “And he who does not take up his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.” (Matt. 10:38-39). There was no escaping the reality that I was either with Christ, or I was against Him; I needed to gather with Him, or else I would be scattering abroad. (Matt. 12:30).
This basic lesson of the reality of the hardcore nature of being a follower of Jesus is lost to the majority of the Christian world. Growing up in the Adventist church, I never saw this primitive zeal of the early followers of Christ. When I became Davidian, I thought I would find it there, but I didn’t. It was exciting, however, to read Victor Houteff’s literature and see how the Rod message called for that zeal, however lacking it was among its followers. And I was no exception – I lost focus and withheld from Christ my full commitment. The Shepherd’s Rod gave me a new picture of Christ’s relationship to the world and my relationship to Christ. Before learning of the Rod message, I thought the clear cut message God sent to humanity was delivered back in the first century and that ever since, the followers of Christ had just faded back into the ways of the world and forgotten the requirements of discipleship. But with the Rod message, I learned that God had reached out to the world through distinct messages and that He sought once again to gather people into a movement and that He bestowed upon it a mission of utmost importance. This wasn’t some long-gone movement from 2000 years ago, it was something recent. Sure, I felt like I missed the boat a bit since Houteff died in 1955, but it still felt alive. But, I soon discovered that it wasn’t. The Davidian movement had become deflated and seemed to be deflating more and more year by year. When I learned that Victor Houteff taught that the Spirit of Prophecy was the Holy Spirit delivering a message of present truth through a living prophet and that we were to expect the Spirit of Prophecy to be alive and active in the church, I knew that I had to find whether there was such a prophet and a message because it would be my opportunity to follow Christ here and now as His disciples did back in the first century. Contrary to all my expectations, I found the Heaven-inspired message, the Heaven-sent messengers, and the Heaven-led movement among the Branch Davidians. UGH! What a pill to swallow. Admittedly, my thought was, “Man… do I really have to be a Branch Davidian?!” But I remembered the words, “Everyone who confesses Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father who is in heaven.” (Matt. 10:32-33). Did I really think I could follow Christ without taking up a cross? Who was I kidding? I knew all along that to follow Christ meant to be ridiculed by the world; both religious and irreligious. So, I knew that my only question needed to be, “Is it true?” And if it was, I needed to follow it, no matter the cost. Well, you all know what my conclusion was. But, I didn’t write this so that you would know my journey.
Here’s the thing: If you are reading this, you are most likely familiar with the Branch movement and message, at least to some degree. Some of you profess to believe the present message and some of you are checking it out, studying it to see if it is true. No matter where you are at when it comes to your stance on the message, what I want to ask you is this – If you were to live exactly as you do now, using your time as you do now, using your money as you do now, using your talents as you do now, having the zeal and commitment you have now; if you were to think and act exactly as you do now, but were living in the first century, would you be a disciple of Jesus? Would you drop everything and follow Him, or would you walk away when He said you’ll have to go without a pillow? Would you leave your livelihood to follow the Galilean Peasant, or would you excuse yourself on the basis of family duties?
The fact is, we don’t live in the first century. But, is the God you believe in a God who stopped speaking in the first century? How about in 1915? 1955? 1986? 2013? Is God still speaking today? Does God have a distinct message, messenger, and movement? If you don’t know, you are in the company of many Jews who lived in first-century Palestine. Some of them just followed the ways of the Pharisees since that was pretty popular, and others didn’t have particular devotion to any movement, but took what they wanted from here and there. Are you satisfied to be today what they were yesterday? This isn’t a mere analogy. Christ is constantly on the move. When people failed to follow Jesus as He walked the streets of Galilee and Judea, they planted their feet on the broad path which leads to destruction. It didn’t matter if they had walked on the straight and narrow all the way until that point. They may have even been baptized by John and would have defended him as a true prophet, but if they didn’t keep pace, they failed to follow Jesus and forfeited life. Likewise, if one acknowledged Jesus as the Messiah, even calling him Lord and Savior, but failed to receive his fresh communications through his messengers such as Paul and John the Revelator, they ceased being followers of Jesus and entered the broad path instead. Jesus is ever marching forward, and Heaven is looking for those who will follow Him “whithersoever he goeth” (Rev. 14:4). To follow Him today, you must follow Him today! So again, if you do not know whether this message is indeed of God and is the very present truth, I implore you to get to the bottom of it, and don’t delay. Give it the full attention you know would have been required of a first-century Jew who heard the teaching of Jesus.
And for those of you who profess to believe the present message, you must realize that a knowledge of the truth carries with it demands. You are not your own, you have been bought with a price, even the blood of Christ! Are you really His follower, not just in word, but also in deed? Or, are you the modern-day equivalent of the first-century man who called Jesus “good teacher” and yet walked away sad, being unwilling to give up all and follow Him?
I now leave you with the statements below for your serious contemplation.
“The Gospel message admits of no neutrality. It counts all men as decidedly for the truth or against it; if they do not receive and obey its teachings, they are its enemies.” – Sketches from the Life of Paul, p. 240
“A few received the message of mercy and warning, while it was rejected by many. Still another class did not accept it because there was a cross to lift. They took a neutral position and thought that if they did not war against the truth they would be doing quite well, but the light they neglected to receive and cherish went out in darkness. They endeavored to quiet conscience by saying to the Spirit of God: “Go Thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season, I will call for Thee.” That convenient season has never come. They neglected the golden opportunity that has never again returned to them, for the world has shut out the light that they refused.” – Testimonies for the Church, Vol. 4, p. 108
“‘We have nothing to fear for the future, except as we shall forget the way the Lord has led us, and His teaching in our past history.’ — ‘Life Sketches,’ p. 196. Yes, this is to be our only fear. Let us, therefore remember, and make positively sure that God is now to lead us in the same way as He did in 1844 and throughout the ages. Make doubly sure that you follow no other kind of leadership, that you let no man divert your attention from this straight path — that you let no one lead you to believe that God is now leading through every Tom, Dick, and Harry. This we must not forget if we are to emulate and succeed the saints that have gone before us, and if we expect to be saved. If we forget this, then as sure as we stand, men will lead us away from God’s message and turn us against His messengers even as the Jewish priests made their followers turn against Christ. God forbid that we should sin against the Holy Ghost by rejecting His message when It comes to us. Only by strictly following this Divine command can we be led right and survive the Judgment for the Living when it starts to ‘sever the wicked from among the just.’ Matt. 13:49.” – Jezreel Letter 2, p. 3
“The work of God is aggressive. No one can stand in a neutral position and yet be a soldier in the Lord’s army. God has commands for His people, and if they keep in close connection with Him, they will hear His voice, and will keep in step with their Captain. They will go forward in the conflict to fight the battles of the Lord. But those who place themselves in an indifferent, non-committal position will gain no victories.” – Manuscript Releases, Vol. 21, p. 446
“‘Who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?’ Was it the voice of the Holy Spirit or merely the voice of man which you heard in the message sent from God?” – Testimonies for the Church, Vol. 5, p. 227
If your heart has been stirred by this message and you are ready to follow Christ as He leads through the present truth, please contact me so that, together, we may gather with Him.
Trent Wilde
