Wednesday in His Word | Transform

Welcome, Wednesday.  The midpoint of this week.  Upon its arrival, may we see progress towards our goals as well as the promise of rest from our labors.

But Wednesday is also the farthest point of time from our sacred Sunday stillness. Does the sermon still ring in our ears?  Or has the message been lost, drowned out by secular sidetracks?

I don't know about you, but by Wednesday I need a faith-filled refresher.  I need a deep dose of God's word.

And so, a new weekly installment in this part of Bloggyland appears.  Wednesday in His Word.  Stop by each week to digest Scripture slowly, savoring a passage and its portent for our daily lives.  I'll share a gem from my recent Bible reading.  Or I'll explore a verse of your choosing (just note it in the comments section on any given Wednesday).  Together we will unwrap God's message and unwind in his grace.

So if you have a week that wants to beat your down, or you want to lift up on wings like eagles, stay here a minute.  Let's read, reflect, and pray together.  Let's rest together in God's word.  Let's simply be, together, tended by our Lord.

Time to Transform

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Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy,

Paul encourages each and every one of us to take a good, long look at God's mercy. By his love and grace, we are accepted, loved, and forgiven.  Just as we are.  Not because of who we are.  But because of whose we are.  God's children.  His kiddos. Adopted little ragamuffins, and he loves the fuzz off of us.  Like the story of the boy and his Velveteen Rabbit, God's love makes us real.  God's love makes eternity real for us.

to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God —

So, we are loved — deep and true and lasting — by our Heavenly Father.  What next? When we are loved, we can't help but reflect that love back.  And the best way to respond to God's love is to dedicate our lives on this earth to pleasing him.

This is where my mind starts to wander and worry.  Does that mean God can put me anywhere he wants?  A rural town?  An Asian village?  Antarctica?  Does that mean I'll have to give up my loved ones?  My comforts?  My life that I've carefully established?  Will I have to drop my figurative fishing nets and follow Jesus, leaving everything behind?

The more I learn about God, the less I believe those worries to hold any worth.  Let's go back to step one.  God loves us. God wants the very best for us.  He's not going to ask us to ditch our life-giving relationships, our meaningful work, or true joys and abiding passions.  He's going to use those things that are nearest and dearest to our hearts as a way for us to minister to others.

this is your true and proper worship.

Worship is more than a Sunday activity.  Yes, this communal, physical, and spiritual gathering with our brothers and sisters in Christ is key.  But it is just the beginning. True worship is filling our souls up in the sanctuary, then carrying that holiness in our bodies and out into the world.  Proper worship is finding ways — quiet and small or big and bold — to glorify God by the way we live.  It is where we use our passions and pursuits to point to our living Lord.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world,

When I think about living out my faith in ways that point others to God, I feel a bit bashful.  It feels right and comfortable in the church.  But talking to my neighbors? Shopping at the grocery store?  Collaborating at a committee meeting?  That's when the patterns of this world push me to put my faith back in the Sunday box, to keep quiet about Christ.

But if we are true to our faith, we can puncture the cultural patterns — like rushing or  shushing dissenting voices, like complaining or keeping up with the Joneses — by consistently exhibiting love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control  (Galatians 5:22-23).  Oh, yeah, that sounds easy.  NOT!  Oops.  There goes that conforming voice of this world.  Hey, Conformity, we've got news for you.  We don't have to conjure up these qualities on our own.  When we worship God, we receive the fruit of the Spirit.  When we walk alongside God, he fills us up and raises us up to more heavenly patterns.

but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

This is where my hope grows huge.  Walking alongside God, getting filled up with the Spirit, setting my mind on those heavenly habits — these are not things I have to accomplish on my own.  God will plant new and better thoughts in my mind.  God will change my heart.  God will transform my ways.  And all for the better.  All I need to do is surrender.  Surrender my need to blend in so I can shine forth. Surrender my need to conform so I can proclaim God's grace.  Surrender my doubts and old habits so I can live, freely and truly, by Christ's example.  It's a daily practice, and one I won't perfect, but I can lean into God and trust in the process.

Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing and perfect will.

By committing to this practice of opening our minds, hearts, and lives for God's transformation, we learn what God wants for us.  We see his plan for how we can be his presence in the world.  We understand how we can please him by loving and serving others.  Our will aligns with God's will.  Our paths merge into God's higher road, and we walk alongside our Lord, experiencing the fullness of Christ.



Lord,

You are the epitome of love and mercy.  Thank you for naming and claiming me as your child, understood, accepted, and forgiven.  Help me to live my life in true worship to you, following in Christ's example of loving and serving others, of glorifying you.  And when this world pressures me to conform, help me to remember your better way.  Fill me with the fruit of the Holy Spirit.  Transform my habits and my attitude.  Show me, clearly and undeniably, your good and pleasing and perfect path.  Then give me the faith and the courage to follow it.

Amen

22 | Be Free

Sometimes as I settle into stillness before God, I struggle to free my mind and heart and soul to be fully present with him.  I feel tied to my devotional "To Do" list.  I keep knotting up in feelings of unworthiness.  I get tangled in earthly distractions and my own inefficacy.

Questions crash the quiet. Am I doing this right?  Am I getting God's message loud and clear?  Am I praying hard enough?  Sincerely enough?  Have I spent enough time with God?  Have I said the things I need to say?  The things he wants to hear?  Questions crowd out Christ's grace-filled gift of freedom.

"Hush," God says. "Enough, already."

Shush the doubts.  Silence the insecurities.  God wants me to know I am enough.

chattingatthesky.com

I am enough because God loves me, not because of what I've done, but because of who he is.  Heavenly Father.  Creator of all that is good.  Steadfast and merciful.

It is enough that I simply rest in the stillness with God.  Our relationship doesn't hinge on what I am doing.  It is secure in what Christ has already done.

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Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.  Galatians 5:1

On the cross Christ set us free — free from sin, free from our unworthiness, free from having to earn our salvation.  In selfless, self-sacrificing love, Christ saved us with a one-time act that lasts for all of eternity.

That's a big gift.  Sometimes the biggest and most generous gifts are the hardest to accept.  But that's exactly what we need to do.  Because the alternative — the doubting our worthiness and questioning God's grace — entangles us and enslaves us in our old ways.  

Paul urges us to throw off that old yoke and to embrace this free gift.  "Stand fast" in our "liberty."  Be bold in our freedom.  Be free in knowing God loves us that much.  

Be free from self-doubt; embrace God-trust.

Be free from striving to earn God's love; embrace being God's love in the world.

Be free from the guilt of old sin; embrace God's forgiveness and a new life.

Be free from doing; embrace being, simply being a child of God

It's a tall order.  But God fills us with the Holy Spirit to help make it happen.

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death!  Romans 8:1-2

If you need help in accepting this freedom in Christ, won't you join me in prayer?

Lord,

I am a creature of this earth, flawed and imperfect.  Stained and rumpled and ragamuffin-y.  For some reason I expect you to see me with human eyes.  I expect your disappointment, and I hide myself from you in shame.  I try to scrub off the dirt and deficiencies I see so clearly.  But you see me like a small child wearing the days adventures and misadventures, and you love me for what you see deep in my heart.  

I know that you invite me to be free from my slavish ways of sin and guilt, of self-doubt, of striving where you have already succeeded.  Help me to be free in your salvation.  Help me to accept your loving grace.  And help me to respond by wrapping myself in the selfless love that says, "My God is bigger and better than I can ever imagine.  My love for God is so overpowering I have to share it with everyone in my midst."  

I can't get to this place of adoration and acceptance on my own.  I need your Holy Spirit to guide me there.  And this is all the more reason I need to be still with you. To still my weak ways and embrace your grace.  To quiet my doubts so there is room for me to hear your gentle voice.

Help me to remember that you accept me totally and completely, just as I am.  Help me feel free to be myself — to be the person you created me to be — trusting that you can use my messy life to write your own special message.  Help me to freely, boldly share your message in my corner of the world.

Amen

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