You Were Never Meant to Follow Jesus Alone

There's a question that might make us uncomfortable: Who is responsible for your spiritual growth?

If you're like most American Christians, your immediate answer is probably "me." And in one sense, that's true. Nobody can force you to pray, read Scripture, or obey God. Your faith requires personal commitment and individual choice.

But what if we've made following Jesus far more individualistic than the Bible ever intended?

The Miracle of Access

The book of Hebrews was written to exhausted Jewish Christians who had lost nearly everything for following Jesus. They'd been exiled from families, lost property, endured public ridicule, and were quietly asking themselves: Is this really worth it?

The author's answer thunders through ten chapters: Jesus is better. He's better than everything you're tempted to return to.

Then comes this stunning declaration: "Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus..."

Confidence. Boldness. Unhindered access to God himself.

For Jewish believers, this would have been shocking. For centuries, God's presence dwelt behind a massive curtain in the temple. Once a year, one high priest could enter with extreme caution, often with a rope tied around his waist in case he died in God's holy presence. The message was clear: God is holy and you are not, so keep your distance.

But when Jesus breathed his last, that curtain tore from top to bottom. God himself did what humanity couldn't do—He opened the way back to His presence.

Two Ways to Approach God

Consider the difference between visiting a mayor and visiting your parents' home.

To meet with a mayor, you'd call assistants, wait months for an appointment, dress appropriately, wait outside the office, and apologize profusely for taking up their valuable time. There's no confidence, only careful deference to someone in power.

But when you visit your parents? You walk right in. You kick off your shoes, raid the pantry, make yourself comfortable, and shout, "Hey, we're here!" Not because you've earned it, but because you're family. You belong there.

This is what Jesus accomplished. He transformed the courtroom into the family living room. The throne of judgment became the throne of grace. You're no longer approaching a stranger hoping for mercy—you're approaching as a son or daughter because Christ's blood was shed for you.

This isn't just a new possibility. It's a living way, opened through Jesus' body. Because He lives, your access to the Father never expires. The door never closes. It doesn't matter how good or bad your week was—your relationship with God is based on Jesus' performance, not yours.

The Plural Problem

Here's where American Christianity takes a subtle but dangerous turn.

When Scripture says "let us draw near to God," it's not addressing you individually. It's plural. Communal. The author cannot even imagine discipleship as an isolated pursuit.

We are designed to come near to God as a people.

Think about marbles versus grapes. At first glance, they look similar—individual pieces clustered together. But marbles are merely near each other. If you remove one, the others don't notice or care.

Grapes, however, are connected through the vine. Remove one grape from the cluster and something changes. They're not just gathered close together; they're growing together, sharing the same source of life.

Which picture describes your faith community? Are you marbles occupying the same room, or grapes sharing life with one another?

The Command to Consider

"Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds."

That word "consider" means far more than casually noticing. It means to study carefully, observe intentionally, pay close attention to, fix your eyes upon. The same word used earlier in Hebrews to say "consider Jesus."

In other words: Give careful attention to Jesus, but also give careful attention to one another.

Become a student of each other's lives.

You naturally become a student of what you love. If you love golf, you study your swing. If you love gardening, you learn about soil and nutrients. If you have kids, you become an expert in their moods and patterns.

Why? Because love pays attention.

The church will only truly change when we stop seeing ourselves as consumers of Christian spirituality and start seeing ourselves as caretakers of one another—students and learners invested in each other's lives.

Your faith was never meant to only affect you. My faith was never meant to only affect me.

God's faithfulness is the foundation, but His people become the instrument of that faithfulness. Someone else is intended to notice your faith and respond to it. The widow trying to step back into public. The new believer who just said yes to Jesus. The seasoned saint still learning to repent.

You have no idea who God might be strengthening simply through your presence, your worship, your prayers.

The Penguin Principle

Emperor penguins face one of nature's harshest survival challenges. After laying a single egg, the mother travels up to 75 miles to the ocean for food while the father balances the egg on his feet. If that egg touches the ice for more than ten seconds, it dies.

Temperatures drop to 60 below. Winds reach 100 miles per hour. Thousands of fathers stand there for 60 to 100 days, losing half their body weight, protecting unborn babies.

No penguin can survive this alone. Not because they're weak, but because they weren't designed to.

What do they do? They huddle.

But here's the remarkable part: they rotate. Warm penguins in the center move outward. Cold penguins on the edge move toward the middle. Over and over, night and day.

No one stays in the center forever. No one stays on the outside forever. The whole colony survives because every penguin is willing to carry somebody else's burden.

This is the church.

Some days, we're all on the outside of the huddle. Life is brutal. Winds blow. Marriage hurts. Anxiety overwhelms. Diagnoses change everything.

For those on the outside: move in. Borrow the warmth of the church. Let others pray for you, remind you of what's true, hold hope until you can hold it yourself again.

But when you're stronger, when your heart is full and overflowing? Don't stay in the center forever. Make room. Move to the edge. Notice somebody else. Sit with them. Pray for them. Carry their burdens.

The Strategy, Not the Alternative

The church isn't God's alternative to loneliness. It's His strategy for the perseverance of those He created in His image.

Following Jesus will be personal, but it can never be private.

We are not a room of people trying to survive storms alone. We are a people continually helping one another make it home—until that day when Christ returns and we arrive fully in His presence.

So stop asking, "What will I get out of church today?" and start asking, "Who needs to be noticed? Who needs encouragement? Who is quietly drifting that God has divinely appointed me to intersect with today?"

Because you were never meant to follow Jesus alone.