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You Have an Assignment
God has a purpose for every life on Earth, but not every life on Earth cares about God’s purpose for their lives. Like Jonah, who ran away from his assignment, and was swallowed by a whale that delivered him to his destination anyway, Christians often run away from their earthly assignments. Perhaps people don’t want to hear the voice of God because it is frightening. He knows and sees everything and is everywhere equally at all times, so with Him, ain’t no such thing as privacy. Like Hebrews 4:13 says: “All things are naked and open in the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do.”
Your Preparation, Like Your Path, Is Unique
Just as everyone has an assignment, the way that God prepares you for your work is unique. As soldiers are trained to win in combat by going to boot camp, so the Lord trains and suits us up for His work. God’s boot camp is more scary than Parris Island, where the Marine Corps trains its finest. But you need not fear, because you are not alone: God goes with you wherever He sends you.
One of the things that makes knowing the will of God frightening, is the fact that some of the things we’re called to do are outrageously impossible for us to do on our own. But that is just the point. God calls us to do what He can do, not what we can do. If He expected us to be already fit to do the task, then we’d have cause to boast. God is GOD. He doesn’t do shared credit. He does it all, and He gets ALL the Glory. Period.
The making of your fitness to live the life God has assigned for you to live begins inside a yielded heart and mind that has let go of your right to do things your way. If you’re anything like me, being yielded doesn’t come easy. Don’t worry about that though, because God has no problem with breaking you to make you. He will WEAR YOU DOWN, the way the a master jeweler shapes the hardest diamond, and yes, it hurts. If need be, the Lord Himself will BOOM! drop the bomb on you. Trust me, after your very personal (and not always private) H-Bomb, you’ll gladly run to put up your under-construction sign. God will deconstruct your entire life, in order to reconstruct you. So, get ready!
All God’s Construction Projects (You), Have a Common Theme: Sanctification
Believe it or not, there is a basic pathway common to all of God’s plans for getting you ready to live the life He has planned for you. It’s called sanctification. Sanctification means holy. Holy means set apart from. For Christians, there’s no getting around holiness. It is a requirement. Why? Because when you are a child of God, you are to be made to be like Him, and He is holy. Like Father, like child (us). 1 Peter 1:15-16 says:
But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”
So what does being set apart look like in your life? Well, if you’re committing adultery, it could look like divorce. If you’re breaking the law, it could look like getting caught and spending time in jail. If you’re in the habit of shacking up, it could look like a series of bone-deep rejections and very nasty break-ups. You could also lose your, health, wealth, career, community standing, etc. All these things (and more!), do what? Get your attention! Attention leads to the teaching moment, and the teaching moment leads to teaching events.
God’s shakeups can feel like you’ve been caught in a tornado. God’s whirlwind, though frightening, is a good thing, because it sweeps away all the clutter in your life that’s grabbing your attention and causing you to move in the wrong direction. What’s left standing is a stunned and humbled you, who’s ready to do what? Yield!
Clean Up Time
Once you’re shocked, bruised, broken, and yielded, God proceeds to clean you up. The clean up occurs in your mind and heart. All those distractions and bad habits that previously occupied the God-space in your life are replaced one-by-one with the things that God values, such as love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance (Galatians 5:22). The cleansing agent in the process of sanctification is the word of God.
The word of God doesn’t get into your mind and heart by osmosis. You can’t get to where you need to be in Christ by just owning a Bible or leaving it open in a room. You have to pick it up and read it. Study it (oh no!), and (gasp!) memorize it. You memorize it for the same reason you buy dishwashing liquid. Your mind should be cleaner than the plates you eat off of. We live in a low-down-dirty-wicked-wicked-wicked world. Just moving through it gets your eyes and heart pinged by low-down-dirty-wicked-wicked-wicked things. Knowing God’s word allows you replace and heal these assaults with His thoughts and power.
Making sanctification possible for us cost God dearly. He sent Jesus, Whose death and resurrection paid the price for our sin-debt, and freed us from bondage to sin. Ephesians 5:25-26 NIV says: …Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word..
Getting Started
The 10 Commandments are a fabulous start, but there’s a lot more details for you to learn. You can only get there by diving into the Bible, making yourself at home, and maintaining an active prayer life. That can only happen if you read your Bible often, and pray throughout the day.
Another reason you memorize the word of God is because there are wolves in sheep’s clothing out there who will give you false information and bad direction in order to abuse your mind, money, or body, and they will do it while thumping on a Bible. Remember how the church looked the other way as Hitler slaughtered 6 million Jews during the Holocaust? If that’s too long ago, remember Jim Jones? Need to be more current, read anything recently about pedophile priests? Needless to say, sanctification is a big deal that needs to be a done-deal and an ongoing-deal in your life.
To be fully outfitted for God’s work in your life, you need to be a part of a solid church community. But before you join a church, make sure their doctrine is sound. You will certainly be challenged by some of the personalities you encounter in church, and there are people who go to church who are insincere. Just like in families and work places, things will get on your nerves. Don’t let that stop you from getting involved! Keep the word in your mind and heart, and be “quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to wrath,” (James 1:19).
The good Lord will forever guide and protect you.
Are you ready? Get ready!
Until we meet again, “Be strong in the Lord and the power of His might!”
Your friend in Christ,
Verneda
© 2014 Verneda Lights. All Rights Reserved.
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