What Does It Really Mean to Follow Jesus?

It is possible to say all the right things about faith and still find ourselves walking in a different direction.

In Matthew 21:28–32, Jesus tells a short parable about a father who asks his two sons to work in his vineyard. The first refuses but later changes his mind and goes. The second responds respectfully and says he will go—but never does.

Jesus asks a simple question: Which of the two actually did the will of his father?

The answer seems obvious. Yet Jesus uses this story to confront a much deeper spiritual problem: the difference between appearing faithful and actually following God.

Following Jesus Is More Than Saying the Right Things

Jesus tells this parable while confronting the chief priests and elders in Jerusalem. These were religious leaders who knew Scripture, held positions of authority and appeared outwardly righteous. Yet when John the Baptist called people to repentance, they refused to respond.

Meanwhile, people whose lives did not fit the expected picture of righteousness—including tax collectors and prostitutes—heard John's message, believed and repented.

They were like the first son. Their beginning wasn't the important part. What mattered was that they ultimately turned toward God.

The religious leaders were like the second son. They said the equivalent of “yes” to God while resisting what God was actually doing in front of them.

That distinction should cause every Christian to examine his or her own discipleship.

What Can Pull Us Away From the Way of Jesus?

Pastor John Howell points to a recurring danger throughout the sermon: fear, power, status and self-interest can make it difficult to follow the way of Christ.

The religious leaders encountered Jesus and saw their established order being challenged. Rather than allowing God to confront and change them, they clung to what gave them security and authority.

Christians face versions of the same temptation today.

We can become more concerned with protecting our comfort, status or sense of security than with loving the people God has placed around us. Fear can even teach us to see other people primarily as threats rather than as neighbors we are called to love.

Jesus offers another way. 

What Does Christian Obedience Look Like?

Following Jesus is not simply agreeing with Christian beliefs. It means allowing those beliefs to shape how we live.

Pastor John connects this with the picture of Christ in Philippians: Jesus did not cling to status or use his position for his own advantage. He emptied himself and became a servant, remaining obedient even when that path led to the cross.

This is the cruciform life—a life shaped by the cross.

For Christians, that means asking difficult questions:

The good news of the first son is that changing direction is possible. Repentance means that our previous “no” does not have to remain our final answer.

Choosing the Way of Jesus

The parable of the two sons invites us to allow God to confront the places where our words and our lives do not match.

Following Jesus means more than identifying ourselves as Christians or knowing the right answers. It means continually turning toward Christ and learning to walk in his way—a way characterized by repentance, obedience, service and love of neighbor.

The question Jesus places before us is ultimately the same one he placed before the religious leaders:

Will we simply say yes to God, or will we actually follow where he leads?

This reflection is based on Pastor John Howell’s sermon “The Two Sons,” from Matthew 21:28–32, preached at St. Dunstan’s Anglican Church in Largo, Florida.