At a Bible study and fellowship group last Saturday we were talking about the benefits of daily devotionals. The study material was challenging us to commit to 30 days practicing the spiritual discipline of starting the day in scripture, prayer and meditation.
Lord knows there are many pastors and lay people that do this better than I do. I get into scripture everyday by some means but I often (who am I kidding- ALWAYS) fall short of the daily practice of starting the day in prayer and the WORD.
Now I talk to Jesus all throughout the day at various times and I will listen to teaching programs on Christian radio with hunger and thirst for a gem of wisdom to carry me through the day. But the discipline of early, daily, dedicated, and yielded prayer and meditation - well I might best be described as a slob in that area. I could rationalize and say that it requires way too much organization: I might even really try to justify it and say that organization falls under administration and I got overlooked when that spiritual gift was being passed out.
The sobering reality that I came to realize myself (better yet through the conviction of the Holy Spirit) was that we can be labeled Christian and be busy "doing" things for Christ which helps define "who" we are but the deeper identity is "whose" we are. I can proudly wear the label "I'm a Christian" and know that the world is going to expect me to be a church goer and someone who ideally has a moral standard that rises above the average expectation of social behavior. But anyone can do that and still not belong to Christ.
I realized in our conversation about daily devotion, meditation, and prayer that to voluntarily submit to the process, (regardless of whether we are organized enough to do it) and WANT to do it is a clarifying moment about "whose" we are. To have a hunger to know Christ so much that we define "who" we are by "whose" we are. I think Paul describes it beautifully in Philippians chapter 3.
(In between this paragraph and the last I got my lesson for the day. I left here for a moment to go copy the above Scripture that I knew would express "whose" we are. I guess God had a plan because he knocked me up side of the head with an admonishment that comes after "my favorite" verses)
I'll close by quoting them here:
Philippians 3:
7But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 10I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Pressing on Toward the Goal 12Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
I usually stop my quote at verse 14 but today Jesus hit me with a great big H-E-L-L-O!!!!! And here was my wake up call:
15All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. 16Only let us live up to what we have already attained.
Okay then I believe He did make that clear to me!
Lord may I start this day with You in mind and I ask Your help to willingly surrender everything I do to You
Have a great day and stay close to Jesus!
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