Mark 8:37,38 - If you are ashamed of me, I will be ashamed of you!

8:37

“Or what can one give in exchange for their soul?” As our society is increasingly anti-Christian we need to bear this in mind. Pressure will increasingly be put on us to conform to the ways of the world, to go along with the zeitgeist. Refusing to go in this direction may be costly in various ways. We need to look at things from an eternal perspective. We need to remind ourselves who is really in charge, who will have the last word.

8:38

The cost of making the wrong decision is horrendous. If we deny Jesus, He will deny us. Note that He says “adulterous and sinful generation”. It will be no use us trying to excuse ourselves by saying that it was really difficult because society was so anti-God. And see that Jesus speaks of Himself coming in His Father’s glory. Jesus knew exactly who He was. We often talk about obeying God out of love for Jesus. That is good as far as it goes, but we should note that, as here, Jesus is not afraid to use fear as a motivator! He faces us up with the stark realities of life as it really is.

We should dwell on the things that Jesus speaks about and let these thoughts renew our minds, so that we ar transformed rather than conformed.