Spiritually Renewed

When you get married, you are declaring your love for your spouse, but that love is always backed up by a commitment to continue loving them through every season of life. You know that when someone tells you that they love you, but doesn’t commit to living out that love, then the declaration of love was just a fleeting emotion. Our relationship with Jesus is the same. If we love Jesus, we will be committed to a life of loving him. If we love Jesus, we will be committed to the work of loving other people (and it will be work). If you’ve been married for any length of time, you know that loving people is hard work. If the people with whom you have an emotional connection can be difficult to love, imagine how hard it is to love your enemies. But if we love Jesus, we will love even our worst enemies.  Love is a commitment, not a feeling. We don’t love Jesus when it’s easy, convenient, or sensible. We love Jesus always — no matter what. It means we are committed to loving the people that he loves. We are committed to rooting out sin in our lives. We are committed to obeying his commandments. A life marked by the love of Jesus is one that will consistently be marked by an unwavering commitment to Jesus’s way.  Reflection/Discussion Question: What gets in the way of committing yourself to Jesus?

Jesus died on the cross while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8), so we can be sure that his gift of peace is just like his gift of eternal life: free. The trouble with gifts is that they need to be accepted in order to be used, enjoyed, or experienced. Jesus offers us his peace through the gift of the Holy Spirit, but if we don’t accept his gift, we will never experience his peace. This is why so many Christians aren’t living in peace, but are instead mirroring the dissension, anxiety, and chaos of the world. They may have come up out of the waters of baptism declaring themselves a new creation in Christ, but they haven’t turned their focus away from the world and onto Christ. While his peace isn’t dependent upon our working for it, our experience of his peace is dependent upon our turning toward it. How do we turn toward Christ’s gift of peace? Philippians 4:4-6 says, “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God” (NIV). Because of what Jesus has done, we can turn and rejoice in him always. We can give everything to God in prayer and petition and we can have a genuine heart of thankfulness. When we take this posture of submission to Jesus in the midst of our circumstances, we fully receive his peace that “transcends all understanding” (Philippians 4:7).  Reflection/Discussion Question: How can you rejoice in the Lord in the midst of your current circumstances?

I started by getting up 15 minutes earlier, before work, to pray. I set my alarm clock, wondering what I could say for a whole 15 min! But soon realized that time was so sweet and not enough time, so I extended it to 30 minutes. Then I decided to add in 20-30 minutes of my Devotionals needing done. There was the SECC FB devotional, my Freedom in Christ workbook homework devotional, my FIC daily devotional book, my FIC phone app of prayers needing said, my ladies group Bible app devotional…. And on it goes. I soon found myself just busting through them to get them all done in the allotted time (Checked off my To Do list in the shortest amount of time!) That is not the heart of God! I had turned my God Time into a list of tasks needing completed! So I’ve asked him to show me what to let go. To just pick one or two and meditate on it slowly and listen to what he is trying to show me today, instead of feeling good about myself that I got all the boxes ticked! I’ve stopped trying to tick through my prayer checklist of “bless him, bless her, do this, do that” - instead just sitting in a posture of waiting and listening. I pray for him to show me the best way to be in his presence, sitting at His feet. Just being with my beloved. I want to be a Mary, not a Martha

I was in the habit of praying, early in the morning, alone, in a room when no one was around and I’ve slowly gotten out of the habit. This challenge has made me think about praying ANY time I am alone. One such time really jumps out to me - my Mom and Dad are living as snowbirds in FL and they have purchased a little bit bigger home (which they hadn’t closed on yet) - for all the guests they have - well they were starting to stress about selling the smaller home they already had. They were having to clean, pack up the dog and leave at a moments notice almost daily. Every Saturday they had to vacate the house and it was becoming very stressful. I was visiting over Spring Break last week, and they were out running errands, didn’t want to bother me, but asked if I could get the dog out of the house for them, they had a showing in 20 minutes. I didn’t think about doing this until I entered the home, but I prayed- I was alone. I asked God for the person coming to see the house be so passionate about having the home that they would make an offer that day. I just can’t capture the feeling in words, but I just knew God placed his hand on the situation and it felt amazing when my Mom sent me a text - we have a verbal offer! I told her what I did and we both got those happy tears, you know the ones you get when you know, you just know the creator of all things truly loves you and craves time with you. My alone time prayers have increased for many other things, I’m not perfectly following a schedule, but I love pouring my heart out to our Father in heaven and know he is ready to listen at any moment. Appreciate the challenge!