GALATIAN 5:7 – You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?”
THEME OF THE DAY: IT’S ME. IT’S ALL ABOUT ME. The theme of today’s nugget is not about the always present temptation in life to orient everything and everyone about ourselves. No, we are not writing about the sin of selfishness and the contradiction it presents to our professed faith in Christ. I sometimes wonder if many Christians, even the one writing this nugget, have subconsciously taken the statement of Jesus, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23) and reword, “If anyone would come after me, let him fulfill his own desires, ignore the interests of others, take up his cross daily and follow me.” Though that would be a great and painful topic to address because it does point to our sinful tendency to say of life, “It’s me. It’s all about me” but that might be for another time. Today, it’s me, it’s all about me, is about answering the question in today’s scripture – “Who hindered you from obeying the truth?” The answer is “It’s me. It’s all about me.” So, let’s dive into what is uncomfortable, necessary, and helpful, if we respond with confession and change.
First and foremost, be willing to own the sin of passivity in obeying God’s commands. Yes, all of us must own this to some extent. And if anyone is feeling a little defensiveness and wanting to deny this, let me convince those of you away from that position. Right now, with Judgment Day clarity and sincerity, are you obeying EVERY COMMAND of God you know and has been written in your heart and mind through Bible studies, sermons listened to, books read and counsel received? With that now settled, glad we are now in the same “confessional camp” of owning this sin. It is simply true and right to confess we suffer from a lack of aggressive, compassionate, and intentional obedience of what we know God commands of us. And should we desire to make any progress out of the pit of passive obedience, it begins with confessing we do this, not defending or justifying ourselves for not.
Next, we must not be in the “blame game” when it comes to our lives being hindered from obeying God’s truth. We cannot adopt the principle of Adam when he sinned in the Garden of Eden, “It was the woman you gave me” (Genesis 3:12). No person, no circumstance, no environment, or anything else prevents us from obeying God’s Word. It is exclusively the one we greet each morning in the mirror. To attempt to shift blame to anything or anyone in our lives is to admit a couple of things. First, we have a faulty view of our individual responsibility before God. He deals with us as individuals not only in saving us but in holding us responsible for obeying Him after salvation. The reason why I added “after salvation” because prior to, we had neither the desire or ability to do so, but in Christ, there is both the desire and ability. And that leads to a question of self-examination – do we desire to obey His commands? If, not we have a serious spiritual issue of eternal significance. True Christians desire to obey and will obey, not perfectly, but progressively.
Another admission in our attempts to shift blame for not obeying God away from ourselves is the unbelief that God is going to judge us for all things in life, including our obedience to His commands – For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil (2 Corinthians 5:10). Here is how the deception of unbelief happens. No Christian denies judgment. No Christian, reading the Bible, dismisses a day of reckoning is coming. But how many Christians orient their lives around that great day by practicing what they possess? It is one thing to profess belief in judgment. It is another to turn profession to practice giving evidence our belief is real. When we hinder ourselves, by choice, from obeying God, we are manifesting a disbelief of being judged.
So, “It’s me. It’s all about me” is not only a confession of the sin of selfish living. It is also a confession of the only source of our failure in our obedience to the Lord. Think about it and may our lives be changed to “It’s Him. It’s all about Him.”
PRAYER: “Father, forgive me for both my passivity in obeying Your Word and justifying when I don’t.”
QUOTE: “God is quick to forgive our sins of sloth toward obeying Him. Let’s be as quick confessing them.”
Because of Him,
Pastor Jim