Following jesus is packing light and loving big

​This morning, Goff's devotional is based on one of the scariest scriptures in the bible to me. It's the story of the rich ruler who asked Jesus what he needed to do to receive eternal life. This dude kinda thought he had it all figured out. Jesus answered him, "Sell all your stuff, give to the poor, and follow me."

I've had conversations with people I trust in the faith community about this one. They always tell me Jesus didn't mean that literally - at least not for us. I always ask, "how do you know?"

I always leave those trusted people, to be honest, a little less unsure about this one than I was when I first approached them.

Because the reality is, if I take an inventory of my life, and on the left is my backpack filled with all the things I'm doing in my life that represent stuff directly related to Keith taking care of Keith, and on the right is a backpack full of stuff directly related to Keith taking care of the poor and walking in Jesus' footsteps from town to town tending to the broken, well, the backpack on the left - it's not a backpack - it's a stinking silo - or eight. And by comparison, that backpack on the right, it's little. It's like a toiletry bag.

People will say, possibly, Keith you're being too hard on yourself.

But I always imagine this experiment.

If today, everyone took that literally. Like, I'm selling off everything I own, dispatching of everything in my life that holds me back from spending all my time and heart serving the poor, the widows, the crippled and the maimed and the lame and the blind - selling everything I own and investing in THAT mission, what would the world look like?

I always imagine what would it take for me to make such a radical move? I think first, it would take me being radically in love with the dude who told me to sell everything I own. I mean, I have a lot of years invested in collecting this life - sell it all off now? For just anyone? And then, it would take me having a heart more than borderline obsessed with taking care of all the people who are not as well off as I am.

And that's why that scripture is one of the scariest in the bible to me. The rich young ruler walked away dejected in that story after Jesus told him what to do. He was dejected because he knew he couldn't do it. He didn't have it in him to sell off all his stuff - give it to the poor - follow Jesus.

I wonder what Jesus thought as that guy walked away. I wonder if he thought that ruler wasn't radically in love with him. I wonder if he thought the ruler wasn't borderline obsessed with taking care of people who weren't as well off as him.

It's scary - because make no mistake, in many ways, I am the rich young ruler.