There's something I want to share today, but I want you to get the full picture, not half of it. So let me start by being honest: I don't prioritize spending time with the Lord. I know, few of us do. But these days, I've run out of the usual excuses. I'm not too busy. I didn't forget. When I have come to spend time in God's Word, I have found myself asleep a half hour later. Was I too tired? No.
I was too uninterested.
So now that that's out there, let me share with you the other half.
Despite these things, there are some days when the Spirit draws me to the Scriptures. That's the only way I can describe it. It's nothing profound, like the parting of the Red Sea. It's just a pulling, sometimes in the form of a simple thought. What's coming next? (I've been working my way through the Bible in a year. I started 4 years ago.) Sometimes the pull is simply in wanting to sit on the couch and read, and for some reason, that day, I'm inclined to read the Bible instead of something else.
These are the days when I read Scripture with intrigue. On these days, I don't find myself asleep a half hour later. And today, it happened early. In fact, it happened in the shower. Don't we all do some good thinking in the shower? What will Paul say next? What chapter am I at?
So I quickly sat down with my next chapter, Romans 12. I study one chapter at a time. Study, not read. So I start by reading the previous chapter to remember what I learned before and to set the stage of context, then I spend the bulk of my time studying the new chapter. (So to my credit, I'm really reading the Bible twice through. No? Ok.)
Romans 12 was a dagger to my hiding heart that wants only my flesh to fight the battle against sin. Because let's be honest, most of us want to look clean. We want to look clean more than we actually want to be clean. Being clean is a dirty job. Looking clean just takes some sweat.
Romans 12 gave me no wiggle room to half-heartedly obey it's commands. Listen to them:
* let love be genuine
* abhor what is evil
* hold fast to what is good
* honor one another
* have a fervent spirit
* rejoice in hope
* be patient in tribulation
* be constant in prayer
Not one can be scheduled into your day. Not one can be done to a degree. Not one can be done only by my body and bootstrap effort. Your love is genuine or it isn't. You are patient or you aren't. You pray constantly or you don't. Behavior modification isn't an option here. How can I change my behavior so that I hate what is evil?
The title of this section of Scripture is called "Marks of the True Christian." That should terrify you. It terrified me. Who can claim to have a heart like this?
Only the One.
So what do we do? Well what can you do? These aren't things you can make happen. These are the heart issues, the roots:
For no good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit, for each tree is known by its own fruit. For figs are not gathered from thornbushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush. The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. Luke 6.43-45)
Don't spend your time trying to hide the fruit that is being born from your wicked heart. Don't give yourself a checklist trying to defeat the effects of a bad heart. You will fail. And it won't change your heart, which is what God is after in the first place! So again, what can we do? Start here:
-pray with me that the Lord would continually use the Spirit to incline us to the Scriptures
-pray with me that the Lord would change our hearts to be like the One who can claim the marks of a true follower of God
-rest with me in the knowledge that God is faithful to complete what he once began in us
Labor with me in pleading to God for a change of heart. He will do it, for it's His desire for us as well.
Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain. (1 Corinthians 15.57-58)
