On my mind....

I want to please the Lord with my life. I want HIM to be pleased with ME. So often, I think, we want it  the other way around, or we live our lives the other way around. Are we trying to squeeze the Bible into our already established life? Or are we living by God's Word, every moment, consulting with the Holy Spirit? I think American Christianity has missed so many things, but this might be one of the GREATEST. We have become humanists. We take Jesus and all of his benefits and that is WHY we become Christians. Not because He is worthy of our lives, but because we KNOW he can make our lives better. We serve ourselves. We wait for the next moment of instant gratification. We make decisions based on what "we feel is right", rather than what God truly wants. We go through the motions of being seemingly faithful in our outward lives- all the while living unto ourselves on the inside. How can this benefit me, or my kids, or my relationship??? What about Him...what about what we ACTUALLY deserve? We wear what we want, we watch what we want, we go where we want, and dare our Holy and Heavenly Father to tell us "No!". We act like if it is a "good" thing, it cannot be wrong for us to partake. But doesn't that actually make it more dangerous? Doesn't that mean the line just becomes more grey and indistinct? What happened to God's people having convictions about living holy lives? About being separate? Why is there no line anymore? Did it disappear when God left schools? I don't think so...that would be too obvious. Or when they threw out prayer and starting cramming evolution and post-modernist theology down our throat? I don't know about that either. I think it started in the home. I think the mom and dad said, "Well, that's not a big deal, we can do that....just this once." I then think it translated into the House of God, because God's people were dull of hearing. We did not fight for God to stay in schools, nor did we fight for prayer. What we are left with is anemic Christians, who barely deserve that title. We have forgotten who God is and what He represents. Isaiah 6:1, 3-5- "In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the Temple. And one cried unto another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts."  Doesn't God's Word say serving him is our "reasonable service"? It is REASONABLE, not ridiculous. And it is necessary for true worship. I hope this helped encourage you. It is something that has been on my mind lately. Living unto God, not unto myself. Bringing my body under subjection and obeying the voice of the Lord. God help us all as we strive. I want to finish my course with joy and the best way I know to do that is to have no regrets. I will never regret living my life for God. But I will definitely regret living my life for self.