There comes a point when everything else starts to ring hollow. The noise, the striving, the endless buffet of opinions, all start to wear thin. You feel it in your chest more than your head. That aching clarity that says: I don’t want the world, I want Jesus.
"Yea verily, and I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but refuse, that I may gain Christ" (Philippians 3:8).
Not the idea of Him.
Not the rituals.
Not the performance of Christianity.
Just Him.
His voice.
His eyes.
His presence.
There’s a kind of love that doesn’t just rescue but reorders everything.
"For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again" (2 Corinthians 5:14-15).
It doesn’t mean abandoning people or hiding from life. It means seeing life rightly for the first time. It means your family, your job, your decisions, even your pain, begin to orbit around Someone far more steady than your own wants.
"And he is before all things, and in him all things consist" (Colossians 1:17).
Following Jesus isn’t an escape from the world; it’s a reentry into it with clear eyes and a whole heart.
"I pray not that thou shouldest take them from the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth: thy word is truth. As thou didst send me into the world, even so sent I them into the world" (John 17:15-18).
Sometimes it feels like being ruined in the best way. Things that used to grip you start falling away. The applause you once craved feels oddly quiet. Old habits lose their flavor.
"I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me: and that life which I now live in the flesh I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself up for me" (Galatians 2:20).
You start preferring solitude with Him over the noise of fitting in. You start waking up with a whisper in your spirit: Come away with Me.
"My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away" (Song of Solomon 2:10).
Jesus never begged anyone to follow Him. He just said, "Follow Me," and kept walking.
"And he saith unto them, Come ye after me, and I will make you fishers of men" (Matthew 4:19).
Those who saw the fire in His eyes and the tenderness in His touch dropped everything. Not because they were coerced. Because they were captivated.
When you truly want only Jesus, you stop measuring your life by outcomes. You stop asking, "Is this working?" and start asking, "Is He near?"
"But it is good for me to draw near unto God: I have made the Lord Jehovah my refuge, That I may tell of all thy works" (Psalm 73:28).
It changes your questions, your posture, your entire way of moving through the world. You realize He didn’t come to be part of your life. He came to be your life.
"For ye died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall be manifested, then shall ye also with him be manifested in glory" (Colossians 3:3-4).
And slowly, something in you softens. The striving ceases. You stop trying to prove you’re worth loving. You begin to believe the Gospel isn’t a ladder you climb, but a home you were always meant for.
"In my Father's house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also" (John 14:2-3).
You learn to breathe again. To listen. To stay.
Wanting only Jesus isn’t about isolation or arrogance. It’s about love. The kind that burns through fog and fear. The kind that says, "You’re mine," and makes you believe it.
"But now thus saith Jehovah that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed thee; I have called thee by thy name, thou art mine" (Isaiah 43:1).
And when you follow Him there, when your heart starts echoing His, you realize: He was always the point. The treasure. The answer. The Way.
"Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life:
no one cometh unto the Father, but by me" (John 14:6).
And you wouldn’t trade Him for anything.
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