You Can't Blame It On Your Family

My Utmost For His Highest

…come, follow Me. —Luke 18:22

“One of the greatest hindrances in coming to Jesus is the excuse of our own individual temperament. We make our temperament and our natural desires barriers to coming to Jesus. Yet the first thing we realize when we do come to Jesus is that He pays no attention whatsoever to our natural desires. We have the idea that we can dedicate our gifts to God. However, you cannot dedicate what is not yours. There is actually only one thing you can dedicate to God, and that is your right to yourself (see Romans 12:1). If you will give God your right to yourself, He will make a holy experiment out of you— and His experiments always succeed. The one true mark of a saint of God is the inner creativity that flows from being totally surrendered to Jesus Christ. In the life of a saint there is this amazing Well, which is a continual Source of original life. The Spirit of God is a Well of water springing up perpetually fresh. A saint realizes that it is God who engineers his circumstances; consequently there are no complaints, only unrestrained surrender to Jesus. If you abandon everything to Jesus, and come when He says, “Come,” then He will continue to say, “Come,” through you. You will go out into the world reproducing the echo of Christ’s “Come.”” CHAMBERS

Do you know Christians who say “That is just the way that I am.” Or maybe they point back to their family and say that is the way we “Smiths” are.  When they are confronted that what they are doing does not align itself with the Word of God they point at their flesh to justify it.  I have used maybe 10 or 15 verses consistently with these devotions, not because those are the only ones I know, but because they are foundational to our life in Christ. 1 Corinthians 5:17 says we have a new life.  The old one is dead.  It is not the point that we will be sinless in this life.  It is the point that we should not embrace sin  in our lives as inescapable or acceptable.  Perhaps we have tried to defeat it or perhaps we are just content with it.  We have hardened our heart toward it and resent anyone who mentions it.  My goal is that people will see Jesus in me, not my flesh.  I want people to be drawn to God through my life, not repulsed because they see no difference between me and them.  It is not the words I say, but the life I live that gives testimony to my faith.  I can type these devotions .. make Facebook posts about God … it matters not if my life, what I do every day, does not reflect an abiding relationship with my Lord.  So let's stop making excuses .. draw near to God .. and let Him put you back on the right track.  ELGIN

Bondye Beni Ou (God Bless You)