June 22

 John 21:22 — Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come , what is that to thee? Follow thou me.

 Before I became a Christian, I had a lot of wrong ideas about the Christian life. One was that Christians did a lot of good things for other people, because that was part of being approved of by God. Well, as I know now, and you already did I suppose, that’s not it. In fact, to a startling degree, it’s not about that at all. Of course we are supposed to do stuff — especially for fellow believers – but the focus is something else entirely. The focus is the person of Jesus. The verse above is the one that makes it plainest to me. The Greek says “What to you? You follow Me.” In other words, mind your own business, and focus on me!

We find similar ideas elsewhere – Romans 14:4 says, “Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? To his own master he standeth or falleth . Yea, he shall be holden up : for God is able to make him stand.” Perhaps 1 Peter 4:14 is bluntest of all: “But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evildoer, or as a busybody in other men’s matters.”

Does all this mean we are not to care about what other people do, or what happens to them, or what’s going on in their lives? Of course not! I could find plenty of counter-texts. But it does mean that we are to be very careful about why we get involved in the things we get involved in (as well as what we do, and who we do it with and for).

Our God is a jealous God. It is not a silly, trivial, jealousy. He is fiercely protective of His honor and glory. These are to be those things we pursue … because the more we pursue these things, the more surely we will grow like Him, and the better we will come to know Him.

There is a great temptation to want to set others on the right path, to help them see the mote in their eyes. Sometimes those things become our business. Most often, they don’t!