All tagged Devotional
Are you like a child before God, or are you walking in your own independent self-righteousness? Do you say “I believe” and yet act like you are in control of your life? Maybe you had trusted God with your life once, but have since taken those reins back from Him, and slowly, over time, found you were walking apart from Him. Do you see where you are? Are you uncertain how, and if, you can come home? Well you can.
Do you deny the sin within you? Do you say to me that you are a moral man, a good man, and that you harm no one? Do you argue that your morality makes you righteous? My response to you is that you have no idea what sin truly is... or else you are deceiving yourself. Let’s look at this further.
Are you worthy? Are you worthy of the sacrifice that God made by giving His only Son to die for your sins? Are you worthy of an audience with the creator of the universe? Are you worthy of forgiveness? There are so many questions like this that most of us would answer with a resounding “NO!”, but is that really true?
This morning we celebrate the moment in Time when God became man. On this day, so many years ago, Jesus Christ was born to a virgin in Bethlehem. I would say that this was the beginning of God’s plan to redeem mankind, but that plan was actually conceived at the very moment of creation, even before Adam and Eve had realized sin, and continues on today.
On this day, Christmas Eve, we are in great expectation of a tiny baby’s arrival into the lineage of David... the Christ Child, Jesus, Emanuel, the Son of God. He will be born in Bethlehem, and a star will shine bright inside each of us to show the way to where He will be held to His mother’s breast. Are you ready to make the journey to where He will be born into the world; into each of us? Is the anticipation of His coming calling you even now to where Angels announce Him?
Have those things of the world died to you? Are you a different person today than you were the day before you first believed? Do you ask the Lord for forgiveness of your sins and then take a deep breath of relief when they are lifted from you, or do you ask, but then refuse to allow His forgiveness to occur in you? Let’s look at this ploy of Satan... our continued spiritual regret and conviction.
Are you having a hard time touching God with your prayers? Do you pray only to find an empty feeling, and conclude by wondering if God has heard you at all? If this is so, then it is time to look not at God, but inward into yourself. Upon introspection you will find something in you that is standing between the Lord, and you... a sin you cherish more than the Peace of Christ, and your heavenly relationship; a sin that needs to be severed from you before you can reinvigorate your conversation with God.
Hearing the gospel, and having it fall on that fertile spot within you creates a need for it that is unquenchable. Are you one of those in whom the gospel of Jesus Christ has found a slight furrow inside you into which its seed has fallen and taken root? If so then despite the season you you are in, you will be called to tend it... time and time again, day after day, until it bears sweet fruit. For all others there is darkness and a withering.
Do you read a simple devotional each morning? Is it one that speaks the truth to you in an interesting new way, or one that takes what is comfortable for you and bends the truth to fit it? Finding the right author who doesn’t caudal our humanity at the peril of our spirituality is the struggle... for both the author, who might be doing harm to God’s Word, and ourselves, as we accept a possibly false premise and feel comfortable in its fallacy.
Feeling the Peace of Christ is one of the most treasured and coveted aspects of the Christian faith; it is a reward for obedience and is our harvest for believing, and living our lives as Jesus instructed us. Do you have the Peace of Christ today? Do you understand the difference between the peace of the world and the Peace of Christ?
How do you pray in intercession? Do you give your own instruction to the person for whom you pray, or do you place their suffering or other need before God and ask His will be communicated, and done, for them? One of the greatest snares in intercession is to allow our sympathy to step between the person requesting prayer, and God. When this happens we attempt to fill the void that only God is qualified to fill.
Are you an individual? Do you see yourself as distinctly and physically individual? How about your personality? In fact, the one is what you are, and the other is who you are. As individuals we are referring to our physical selves, and although alike in many ways, God has made each of us unique. Our personalities, on the other hand are experienced more than seen, and so boundless in their nature that only God can truly understand them. When Jesus speaks in John 17:22-23, which of these is he referring to?
Do you attempt to hide who you are from God by covering yourself in some fashion? Do you pretend to be spiritually in control when in fact you are anything but? Are your sins hidden within you where you feel they are safe from God’s eyes? Who do you fool, but yourself? Lay your iniquities before you and seek God’s help in dealing with them, because He has known them all along... even in the recesses of your heart.
We are creatures of both natural and spiritual construction. It is God’s desire that our natural selves be disciplined, and come under the authority of the spiritual, but that wild and unschooled nature is not a passive student in this transition. Have you gained control over your natural self? are you waiting for God to make this choice for you? Well He has His desire, but the choice remains yours.
Have you given up everything you are to Jesus Christ? It is easy to lay down the sin, and bad things in our lives, but have you also laid down the good? Abandoning those things that we naturally identify as good is the most profound test of our faith. Being able to leave behind anything that is contrary in order to immerse ourselves in God’s will for us is the epitome of faithfulness and obedience.