Have You Ever Stopped to Consider?

Have You Ever Stopped to Consider?

In this second post, God's still stirring my thoughts today. 

Have you ever stopped to really think about your whys behind your ways?

Why do you have this like and not that one.

Why do you "love" this thing and not that one. 

Why do you go and do something that others don't. 

Why do you...well you get the idea. 

In Christ we should be seeing Christ in us. We should be seeing His attributes and not ours. 

In Christ our whys behind what we do, what we say, what we think ought to be more aligned with His.

In our day to day life, we ought to look to see where life is going.  Not just to be found to be along for the ride. 

The worst thing a believer in Christ Jesus should be found by Him doing is nothing with what He gave them as a gift through the Spirit. 

Are you living for your hobbies or sports, even though you call it something else?

You will rename your activities in order to not feel uncomfortable with them.  

You will rename sin to keep from the guilt of it.

You will cling to things and people who bring only joy in your life when Jesus said that He should be your joy. 

Being yoked with Jesus means learning from Jesus on our journey in life.  Not going our own way, doing our own thing.  Especially under the guise of "because we deserve it". 

We will find all kinds of things to do because we think we deserve it. We will look for ways to avoid things and say we don't deserve this or that. 

We will indeed even avoid obedience to Jesus in the name of personal happiness because we say something is too far or something is too complicated to do. 

We can be Spiritual wimps. We can easily make ourselves believe we are right in being how we are!

Satan will indeed help us in this wrong way of thinking.  He would rather you live a watered down life in Christ than be challenged to grow in Christ. 

He would rather you rename things that aren't causing you to grow in Christ than be taking them from your life. 

Paul taught of his learning the secrets of contentment. We will do, honestly, everything and anything, to find what we want to label as contentment. Not what God calls it. 

WHY do you put so much time, energy and effort into what you claim to enjoy?  

DOES what you claim to find joy in, further your walk with Jesus or does it really make you put him on a shelf until what you do is over?

WHAT are you doing in life that is the opposite of what God's already told you to be doing? Are you suffering through something because you honestly are afraid of the step of faith that He's telling you, repeatedly, to take?

ARE you using excuses of time, distance, even health, as reasons not to do something?  

Certainly things to consider. In our restarted life in our new hometown, it's been heavy on my mind.  

I know people who are Christians who are either in denial and are content with it.  Knowing well that God’s waiting on them to take their own step of faith. But they won't or aren't doing it.

I know people who are Christians who are heavily laiden with excuses to be where they are. 

Excuses began with Adam and Eve...we come by that sinful attribute honestly from our lineage. 

If you are reading this and if even a pang of guilt touched you, stop what you are doing. That's the Spirit talking to you. 

Rather than argue or complain to me or God, realize what is behind your words and feelings. I just write what I am told to write.  It's no secret in the few years of writing these posts that I have stated that only in Christ am I a writer. He speaks and I write, that's how it works. I have struggled for over 35 years to write something of my own. 

If you also read your Bible know this truth.

James 4:17 NASB "So for one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, for him it is sin"