Is your mind boggled by the fact you belong to Jesus Christ? In spite of all the junk that comes your way, the daily trials and tribulations, does the love of God still rock your world? Of all your relationships, are any as satisfying as the relationship you have with God and the fellowship you experience with Him through His Spirit?
What would happen if we started asking ourselves these tough, penetrating questions on a regular basis? Paul’s hope in raising these issues in his letter to the Philippians was to help his readers live out what ultimately matters in life.
Here is their story; one you will see is much like ours today. They were affluent and worldly, but they had become complacent and discontent in their hearts. They complained, they argued, they exalted themselves above others, they took pride in their flesh, and they worried about the future. They held tightly to their worldly possessions. They were uneasy, restless, always striving for something more. The busyness and clutter of life bogged them down and robbed them of the joy of knowing Christ.
We’ve probably all been there and know exactly what that feels like, and it is not good. But is doesn’t have to be that way. We really can say that nothing compares to knowing Christ and experiencing the joy of our salvation. Sometimes we just have to be reminded what we truly have in Him, and that He is the source of our contentment and joy.
Ask your self these questions. Digest what it means to belong to Christ, to know and experience the love of God, and to walk in fellowship with His Spirit. These are the realities that matter, the realities that bring satisfaction and contentment to the soul.
I think this is one of the main points of the book Ecclesiastes. We let everything “under the sun” invade our lives, and like Peter we take our eyes off of the Lord Jesus and we begin to sink.
A few of the best ways I’ve found to combat this is to “chew” on the Word daily, be mindful of Lord at all times, have confidence in Rom. 8:28, know what the end game is and the hope of our calling. Have confidence in the working of the Holy Spirit within you knowing that ” it is God that works in you to will and to do according to His good pleasure”, and to know that Christ will complete the work that He started in you. God does not call us to failure but to overcome any and all objections satan might throw up.
The world does have a way of making “everything under the sun” look pretty good to us. Still the things of this world do not compare to Jesus and the fellowship we have with Him. I do like the truths you put forth in helping you combat the temptations of the world.
I eventually sat down with the Bible even though I had a strong sense of skepticism and contempt given the “nutbars” that I had seen on TV as I grew up.
As a child I vividly remember another child, a little girl, telling me I was going to hell because I was not baptized. This was probably the start of that contemptuous mindset of mine. How in the world does having someone drip water on me, or being dunked save me? Nevertheless, about thirty years later the void within me prompted me to think that perhaps I should read this Bible to find out for myself what it has to say.
The little girl was right, but for the wrong reason. The concept of baptism we were erroneously thinking of was not correct. Indeed water does not do it – the Holy Spirit does. I am now thankful to her for fueling my unease.
In fact I was not “going” to hell – I was in hell, and I was spiritually dead. Finally, after reading enough, the Holy Spirit baptized me. Now I am alive in Christ through an acquired knowledge. The knowledge provided by God, the author of the Word.
I read enough to eventually be “born again” into life. Like the labor a mother endures, it was not without pain. The contradictions of religion I experienced while in attendance at several different denominations caused me stress.
At some point I finally came to the words “It is finished”, and it was a wow! moment. The tension was eased. I could now recognize the contradictions of religion, but I need not feel conflicted by it, rather I could now confidently and boldly identify it.
I remember exactly where I was the first time I heard the three Bobs on the air, and they rocked my world with their unadulterated message of “it is finished”.
I have noticed listening to callers to the People to People broadcast that by the tension in the voice you can pretty much tell what level of knowledge of the saving Grace of Christ they understand. I say this with humility, and to some degree I still count myself with them, because each day I am transcending this flesh to an ever greater appreciation of what God created for us.
God gave us the Word and he created an Eden floating in a vast expanse of darkness and abyss on which the Word became manifest.
I think about what humanity did to the Word – his son Jesus – and how it forever will be the ultimate act of human devastation ever. I think about His gracious response: Truth and Life. The love of God rocks my world.
I’m right there with you, friend. Christ couldn’t have said it better through you. Thanks!
Once I learned that Jesus had done everything for me, that I had been given every spiritual blessing, I truly understood what it meant to walk in dependence upon God, to do what God tells me to do and say what God tells me to say. To be available at all times for Christ to live through me, rather than struggling day after day trying my best to attain a righteousness of my own. Only then did I learn what God had prepared for me, and it has never been anything that I thought or even imagined it would be. I can rest in His promises with full assurance that God is faithful.
Sounds like a normal daily lifestyle. Looks like there’s nothing new under the sun, as Dave reminded us. For a while I ‘tried’ to do all the neat suggestions that would enable me to keep my eyes on Christ. I found that I couldn’t do it. I fell back into the old, “trying to live the Christian life” by myself… using the strategies to focus on Christ as rules and formulas to have a specific outcome. Couldn’t do it. My prayer became, “Lord, I can’t do this–You do it”. and left it there. You know what? He did it 🙂 He brings my focus to Him, He urges me to speak of His Son, He nudges me to go do something nice for someone. I honestly gave it an old heave-ho, but couldn’t do it. Now? Simply being available to God to do as He bids. So less stressful.
Lisa,
That is good stuff. The realization that we cannot and He can is a milestone in the Christian life. “The just shall live by faith” and “without faith it is impossible to please Him”. This is entering into the Sabbeth rest that was a shadow and a type of what was to come and now is. You describe so well the Spirit that is alive and active within. “All things are by Him, through Him, and for Him” and Jesus gets ALL the glory. Looking back; without a doubt His plan and His purpose have always turned out better that what I would have done if I had the control (which I don’t).
This is the rest that the world is so desperate for. The counseling, medication, self-help books, etc. have not and cannot provide.
Thank-you Lisa, you said what I needed to hear. A simple but powerful prayer: ” Lord, I can’t but you can, take over.” His yoke is then easy, and we can rest in his love and grace as He lives in and through us. I appreciate the reminder, especially since it’s so easy to take over and the results are a total flop.
God Bless your day with His unfailing love.