What Do You Love

Illustrations:

The Stalker (1979) Russian movie about the Zone and the Room inside the Zone.

The Room grants you your deepest desire. The travelers get there, but don’t go inside because what if they don’t want their deepest desire?

Crossing the Rubicon (49 B.C.)

Julius Caesar leads his Roman army across the Rubicon to enter Italy and declare himself the first Roman emperor. Once you cross the River, there is no going back.

John 1:35–42 CSB

The next day, John was standing with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!” The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus. When Jesus turned and noticed them following him, he asked them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?” “Come and you’ll see,” he replied. So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. It was about four in the afternoon. Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard John and followed him. He first found his own brother Simon and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated “the Christ”), and he brought Simon to Jesus. When Jesus saw him, he said, “You are Simon, son of John. You will be called Cephas” (which is translated “Peter”).

What is your wish?

The Room

Read the Scripture (John 1:35-42)

A couple disciples of John the Baptist hear John call Jesus the Lamb of God and immediately get up to follow Jesus.

I imagine them walking at a safe distance behind Jesus, too awkward to speak up and say something, so after a little bit Jesus turns around and asks them a piercing question. What do you want?

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What we want, this thing we ultimately LOVE is the core of our identity.

What you think isn’t the most important. What you BELIEVE isn’t even the most important. It’s what you LOVE.

That deepest love in your heart shapes every action you do.

Proverbs 4:23 tells us to guard our heart because everything we do flows from it.

If you’re like me and you grew up going to church, it’s really easy to know the right answer to the question: What do you love? You KNOW that the right answer is Jesus. You might even BELIEVE the right answer is Jesus.

But do you really, ultimately, in your heart, above every other thing LOVE Jesus the most?

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But these two would be disciples don’t really have an answer for Jesus. It’s like they’ve come to the Room and they have this feeling of not being really sure if they even want to step inside. So they dance around the question and ask Jesus where he’s staying. It’s almost like they’re trying to spend some time with Jesus to see if he’s the real deal.

But Jesus is so gracious towards them. He doesn’t say “you can’t know where I’m staying until you decide to go all in”. He doesn’t demand their answer right there on the spot. He says to them, come and see.

I think these disciples realize that once they go all in, once they realize that their ultimate love really is Jesus, there’s no going back.

Crossing the Rubicon

2. Once you can’t go back, you’re free to run

Once these two disciples spend the day with Jesus, I think they realize that they are all in.

One of these disciples, the first one to be named in john’s Gospel is Andrew.

Andrew has hit this point of no return, he has crossed the Rubicon, and now he’s free to run.

And the first place he runs is to his brother Simon and says, “Simon. We found the one. We found the Messiah we’ve been waiting for. Come with me. You need to meet him.”

It was the freedom that comes with not going back that allowed Simon to go and tell people, even his own brother, about Jesus.

So what are some take-a-ways for us?

Look at your life, especially your habits. What do they say about the thing you love the most?

Would you step into the Room? Or are you afraid that the thing you think you love isn’t actually what you love the most?

2. If you identify a disconnect between THINKING that you love Jesus and ACTUALLY loving Jesus, how to do re-shape that?

Worship re-shapes our loves and re-trains our habits.

Allow your worship to re-form what your heart looks like. This includes times of singing, but it’s JUST that. You worship when you read the Word, you worship when you pray…

I’m excited to continue to follow the leader with you all.

Close in prayer.