Laying Down to Build Up
By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. 1 John 3:16
…Righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne. – Psalm 79:2b
Following Jesus every day in the everyday means He takes me some uncomfortable places…like face to face with areas where my sinful nature has had unchallenged dominance, either because I have excused the sin as “understandable,” or because it has become woven into my lifelong pattern completely unrecognized as the poison it is, or because the Holy Spirit has mercifully waited for the “right” opportunity to confront me on it. (There might be other reasons, but right now these are the big three.) Currently, God has orchestrated events that capitalize on all three.
The sin is annoyance, or irritability.
If your heart responded just now with: “Oh, but everyone has bad days!” Or, “anyone would be irritated in your situation,” please don’t obscure with flawed sympathy what the Spirit of God is trying to do. His job is to make us like Jesus, not make us feel good about ourselves. Jesus established God’s throne on the foundation of justice by laying down His life. When I am irritated or annoyed, I undermine the Kingdom through words and deeds of injustice: not giving the love I am called to give, or the truth I am responsible to speak. When I am self-seeking, looking to have things go the way I prefer, I am not laying down my soul. The Jesus I seek to follow gave up all His “things must go my way” to come to the planet as a human, to make the payment for our freedom from slavery to sin.
God has designed my situation so that the bondage I have to this particular sin has become very obvious. He has also graciously exposed how widespread this is in my history… It’s a long one.
Last year’s verse was about seeking His kingdom and His righteousness. This is just another part of the same focus. Seeking His righteousness, seeking to be like Him, must include confronting and battling the things that are NOT like Him, and and the longer I take the path behind Him, the more I see where I need to become like Him, laying down my soul for others.
Still following Jesus everyday…no one else is worth following.
Christi
0 Comments