Do you realize the weight of the one who has invited us to follow him? He is worthy of more than church attendance and casual association; he is worthy of total abandonment and supreme adoration.

One of my favorite sights is to look across a room packed with people with their Bibles in their laps, studying who God is and what God has said- after midnight.

This is the reality about humanity. We are each born with an evil, God-hating heart. Genesis 8: 21 says that every inclination of man's heart is evil from childhood, and Jesus' words in Luke 11: 13 assume that we know we are evil.

To be a disciple of Jesus is to make disciples of Jesus.

We are settling for a Christianity that revolves around catering to ourselves when the central message of Christianity is actually about abandoning ourselves.

When God tells us to give extravagantly, we can trust Him to do the same in our lives. And this is really the core issue of it all. Do we trust Him? Do we trust Jesus when He tells us to give radically for the sake of the poor? Do we trust Him to provide for us when we begin using the resources He has given us to provide for others? Do we trust Him to know what is best for our lives, our families, and our financial futures?

The Life of Christ determines everything about us.