Whose fool are you?

"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate." (1 Cor 1.18-19 NIV)

I recently heard a story of how a man called John Wimber came to follow Jesus. He was in someone's living room when all of a sudden he found himself on his knees, sobbing and recognising Jesus as His Lord.

As he did this a memory of a time passed came to his attention. He remembered being in a park in LA trying to find an old friend with some money. As he was waiting for his friend, a drug dealer, he saw a man walk by wearing a sandwich board. On the front it read "I am a fool for Christ", on the back simply "whose fool are you?"

At the time Wimber thought this silly, but when on his knees in that living room he realised that Jesus was asking him the same question; will you be my fool? He said 'yes' and God worked through him in amazing ways.

As I was watching that video I sensed that God was asking me the same question. I was moved and if I am honest, terrified. Am I really willing to be Jesus' fool? Am I willing to let go of all other symbols of identity and abandon all I have to him? Am I really willing to let go of my reputation, of my attempts to make people like me? I want desperately to say yes to this question, because God always uses the "foolish things of the world to shame the wise" (1 Cor 1.27). I have said yes to Jesus if He will help me get there.

We are all someone's fool. Maybe we are our own fool. Maybe we are pursuing our own agenda for success with the trappings of Christian discipleship. Or perhaps we are swallowing the world's agenda hook, line and sinker. I know I have done that for a long time. But the goal of this Jesus thing is to give everything up to Him in order that He might work in us the thing that is really life - his abundant life.

I'm a fool for Christ (in training). Whose fool are you?