A beautiful day, proceeding a misty morning – thank You, Father, for the beauty of the world that You have created! Praise and honor to You!
Romans 1:8-17 (<<click here to read the passage)
Yesterday, I spoke of Not Loving Out of Obligation. If we are striving after Christ, there are many things that fit into the category of not doing out of obligation. For example, service.
Paul says in verse 15,
So I am eager to come to you in Rome, too, to preach the Good News. NLT (emphasis mine)
Many of us would be hard-pressed to serve Jesus in a spirit of eagerness. I feel that way sometimes but, I’m afraid that too much of the time, as my study Bible* suggests, I serve out of habit, a feeling of obligation, or perhaps even with a feeling of reluctant duty.
How many of us as children relished brushing our teeth and bathing every day, whether we “needed” to or not? Talk about reluctant duty! Those things may not have led to life-or-death situations in our lives, but not doing either for a time could have led to severe tooth decay and possible serious skin conditions, not to speak of all the friends we would have lost!
But serving God is a life-or-death situation. It can mean life or death for us as well as others. We all need God. And God uses us all to reach those who don’t know Him. He needs us to eagerly serve Him.
The same motivators for loving Jesus apply to serving Jesus. There’s an unending list of things that Jesus has done for us, foremost our salvation – which we could not possibly have achieved on our own. The list would be endless if we began to write out all the things we benefit from every given day that come from His boundless supply of blessings. To name a few: the roof over our heads, food on our table, loved ones – near and far, our health, our bodies, the entirety of creation both great and small!
So why aren’t these things motivation enough to prompt us to proclaim the wonders of the gifts He extends to us all? Even with prompting, I doubt that eagerness would describe any of our approaches to sharing His amazing provision.
Maybe what we need is a reset – a mental reset.
I recently watched some TikTok posts featuring the lead pastor of a large multi-church organization. He began by saying that he had gone to a counselor because he was in pretty “bad shape”. The counselor put him through a barrage of tests, and everything came back great – physically, spiritually, and relationally he was healthy. His problem was that he was mentally exhausted.
When asked about the greatest commandment, he was challenged. “Are you loving God with all your heart?” “Yes” “Are you loving God with all your soul?” “Yes” “Are you loving God with all your mind?” …and then the pastor paused and said, “Interesting. How do you love God with all your mind?”
Long story short, it took him over 18 months to get his mind to shut down on “church, church, church” which for him meant “work, work, work”. He changed as he focused on God and His word, finally getting to a point where his mind was reset.
Maybe we are stuck in a rut of uncertainty and doubt about what we can and cannot do for God. He’s our Creator, right? He knows who we are down to the molecular level, down to every neuron that zaps through our brain. He knows what we can do! Ask God to help you reset your mind so that a fresh eager attitude is born that wants to obey him and tell others about Christ. Amen.
*Life Application Study Bible New Living Translation
Sept 20th, 2022, Tues, 12:31 pm
