Courageous Followers Day // Matthew 9:9

Today is known as Courageous Followers Day. It was inspired by Ira Chaleff’s 1995 leadership book, The Courageous Follower: Standing Up to and for Our Leaders. We hear a lot about being leaders in our world, which is a good thing, but leaders need followers too. The Christian is called to lead by dedicating their life to following Jesus. I do my best to adhere to this in the church so that people will know: if they follow me, we are all heading in the right direction. It isn’t always easy—and it actually seems increasingly difficult in our post-Christian culture.

Jesus was known to offer a pretty simple two-word invitation when He called His disciples: “Follow me.” One of my favorite accounts, which blends really well with Courageous Followers Day, is in Matthew 9:9, when Christ called the tax collector Matthew to follow Him. Tax collectors were despised as instruments of Roman oppression. The Roman occupiers didn’t have much (if any) respect for the tax collectors either, because they were Jews. So when Matthew decided to follow Jesus, he was upping the ante with both the Romans and the Jews. Matthew had to leave his lucrative career for the life of a nomad and link up with others who already saw him as a threat and a traitor. The decision to follow Jesus was costly for Matthew in every way. Still, his bold decision led to the Gospel that appears first in the New Testament.

We all need to be courageous followers, regardless of our leadership status. It is my hope and prayer that you will make the courageous decision to follow Jesus, despite how costly it might seem in the here and now. It might seem hard, but I promise you that the benefits are out of this world!