by David Brenneman
"Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; Keep watch over the door of my lips. Do not incline my heart to any evil thing, To practice deeds of wickedness With men who do iniquity; And do not let me eat of their delicacies. Let the righteous smite me in kindness and reprove me; It is oil upon the head; Do not let my head refuse it, For still my prayer is against their wicked deeds." Psalms 141:3-5.
"For my eyes are toward You, O God, the Lord; In You I take refuge; do not leave me defenseless. Keep me from the jaws of the trap which they have set for me, And from the snares of those who do iniquity. Let the wicked fall into their own nets, While I pass by safely." Psalms 141:8-10.
Complacency, compromise, feelings based on these, comfort rather than the relinquishing of our will to His will in us.
We have but one and the same path set before us as has every Believer in the history of the Church...live for Jesus in all that we do. He didn't come to be served but to serve. The will of God for us in Christ Jesus is our sanctification...1 Thessalonians 4:3a.
Take a good look at the participation of Believers on any given Weekend and you'll find no short of people who compromised when it comes to resting in the Lord as He intended a rest to be. We, myself included, often or in the case of many more, don't try to rest in the Lord on a Sunday. It has to be filled with things that take our attention away from our walk with Jesus.
Satan's schemes are all around us, worse than any trip through a county fair's main row where all the rigged carnival games are and countless people are taken in by.
Yet in the same respect that people going through those rigged games think they can beat the game, we think we can beat Satan at his own games on our own and don't see how that's part of what he uses to sucker us in.
We need God's help to make headway in growing in Christ. We cannot rely on our strength of will to be enough or be effective against the schemes of the devil. We need to hold to a commitment such as those in Chapter 11 of Hebrews, the Faith Chapter, did.
It's not easy letting go of things that we learned to 'love'. But my Dear Reader, if we are striving to live a life approved of God in Christ Jesus, those things will need to go...and should we be driven to finally pray with that in mind...we will see the Spirit do something about them that we in and of ourselves could not.
We need the help of the Spirit of God to defeat the areas of our lives that are yet still tainted by sin's influence. We need to recognize where and when we compromised. Where and when we were complacent. Where and when we said, thought or did life in a way that's not working towards that will of God for us. We cannot trust ourselves. We have and will lie to ourselves. We need the impartial, immovable, all-knowing Spirit of God to work in us. Breaking the strongholds that need broken within our hearts.
I can't trust me to do right by me. Neither can you. It takes a lifetime of commitment to take up your own cross and follow Jesus. Not weekend visitations with Him for a few hours. We are taught of how simple and easy it is to just give a little here and there to make what we perceive life to be all that much simpler for us.
We read in Paul's letters of what he struggled to rid himself of in order to run the race set before him. Paul's struggles are of only a different kind than yours and mine and were just as debilitating at times.
We are exhorted to run the race set before us as though to win the prize. Any runner in any race drops everything they can in order to be lighter and faster than those they race with. Paul's teachings as lead by the Spirit of God show us that still better way.
We get sucked in collecting things that will yet still perish with time.
We get suckered into wasting hours watching things that don't matter in light of eternity. Pouring emotional energy into those things that gain us nothing in Christ.
We get lead astray in so many ways that we can't even recognize that it's happening until after it's happened.
We need to commit to what Jesus committed to. Living a life approved by God the Father. Even if it's an emotionally painful thing in letting go. Even if it's a physically expensive thing in letting go.
As one of Dr. Charles Stanley's Life Principles says...anything we hold onto too tightly will turn to ashes.
Do we WANT to see huge huge gaps in our Christian life where all that's tested by the fire of God's truth gets burned up?
We need to want what God wants for us. In everything in all things. The Disciples had to learn to think differently and so do we.
Ask for help from the Spirit to clear your thinking and to give you the mind of Christ. Expect and watch what will change.
Want what God wants for you. God wants us to become conformed to the image of His Son.
That's what you need.
That's what I need.
All NASB Scripture Excerpts used by permission.
New American Standard Bible
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