Flight Paths

"Singing is easy and so is painting compared with this exacting, soul-taxing art of living. One cannot think anything he pleases, or feel as he wants to, or act as he is inclined to. He must walk the narrow path. Jesus walked it, and he calls men everywhere to become his followers. He is rigorous in his demands. He is inexorable in his commands. He is despotic in the limitations which he imposes. He says, 'Come unto me!' We ask, cannot we go to others? His reply is, There are no others. Come to me! And when we come he says, 'Follow me!' We hesitate and ask, 'Is this really necessary, can we not choose an easier way?' His reply is: 'Follow me.' 'If you do not take up your cross and follow me, you cannot be my disciple, and no one comes to the Father except through me.' He says, 'Abide in me!' and we demur and wonder if after all it is necessary to shut ourselves up in what seems to be so narrow and limited a sphere. But he says to us with that strange, dogmatic, compelling accent which stirred the hearts of the people long ago in Galilee, 'Verily I say unto you, unless you abide in me, you have no life at all in you!'"
Charles Edward Jefferson, "The Character of Jesus," p62-63
{Via Edwin Crozier)