This book, Go Now, is filled with bold faith and miracle stories of head hunters in the northern Philippines, to Communist China where Wendell and his wife Daisy, made over 1000 border crossings with suitcases filled with Bibles. Wendell gives you an intimate inside look at how God worked deep in his heart rescuing a discontented young man and crafted him into an effective tool for His service. Now, onto Post #3 of 9.
Then He said to the crowd, “If any of you want to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross daily and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you will give up your life for my sake, you will save it. And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but are yourself lost or destroyed?” (Luke 9:23-25 NLT”)
I had read these verses many times before. I had memorized them as a child. They were words that always left my heart in unresolved conflict. As I read them now, however, it seemed that they were more than bothersome words. They were calling to me personally and I felt I really needed to hear what Jesus was saying. It was as if Jesus himself were speaking directly to me, that same Jesus who had promised to be with me always, the One who is the same yesterday and today and forever. As I stilled my heart and listened, I found a vague familiarity in the words that took me back to something distant, to a childhood memory. I strained to hear the voice I knew was certainly speaking to me yet seems so hard to hear. Spiritual ears that had been deaf for so long, were finally came to life!
“Wendell,” Jesus seemed to be saying. (I somehow knew it was him!) “You have seen how everyone is searching, striving, and trying desperately to prove they are someone, that they have value and worth. You see how they are never sure, never completely satisfied that they are living out their destiny or accomplishing anything significant or meaningful. Through human efforts, you will fail every time. Wendell, if you will let me, if you will trust Me, I will give you real life, the kind of life you are searching for!”
I drew deeply on the cigarette and thought long and hard on what God seemed to be saying. Could it really be this simple? Was there really a way I could experience what my heart was so intensely longing for?
I went back and read the fine print of the promise. To gain, I must lose? Lose by deliberately making choices that really didn’t make any sense? Deny myself? Take up my cross daily and simply follow Jesus? I didn’t understand how this worked. I figured most other people didn’t understand how it works either because I didn’t know of anyone whom I could say really denied themselves daily to follow Jesus. I was perplexed but I felt I was on to something, albeit something that would probably come with great risk.
Suddenly I remembered a thought, a burst of inspiration I had jotted down on a scrap of paper during my last year in high school I had written, “You won’t find your real purpose for living until you find a purpose worth dying for.”
At that moment, it all began to make sense: Jesus had lived his life to the fullest because He found I was worth dying for. Me! Perhaps I would find my real life by dying to my own self-interest in exchange for following and serving Jesus’s interests. The question now was: would I – could I – be willing to do this to the extent that Jesus was asking? I knew without a question that there would be no halfway point in this offer. It would have to be all or nothing, either a yes or a no.
BOTTOM LINE:
I crawled back through the skylight let myself drop onto the bed beneath. I had a strange sense that I was at a major turning point in my life, and the choice seemed clear. A compromised agreement with Jesus’ invitation would probably be worse than completely rejecting his offer. I knew I did not have the strength and the willpower to truly hold up to the conditions required of me. The situation would require some outside assistance. With an understanding that I had little to lose and with determination to aggressively pursue Jesus’ offer, I fell into a peaceful sleep.