Today’s blog is a continuation
of part of a chapter taken from my book,
Victory
Over Backsliding.
Our topic centers around a simple thing
we need to do, and yet, may be extremely difficult if we are not careful to
make it a priority at the start of each day.
Undisciplined Spiritual Life
One of the greatest downfalls of many Christians no
matter how long they have known the Lord is that they become lazy in their
daily devotions. Jesus wisely said:
Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation:
the spirit indeed is willing,
but the flesh is weak. Mathew 26:41
The
Apostle Paul, having recognized the unwillingness of the flesh to submit to
spiritual things, took control of it when he said, I beat my body and make it my slave (I Cor. 9:27). The flesh is lazy when it comes to the things
of the Lord. It wants to rule when it
comes to being disciplined in spiritual matters. While it is true that in our busy life many things clamour for top priority and
attention, there is no worthwhile substitute for spending a quiet time with the
Lord reading His Word, meditating on it and praying daily. Perhaps we fail to see the many wonderful
benefits of feeding our spirits on a daily basis. One very important thing happens when we
continue to feed our spirits. We grow
spiritually and die to the things of the flesh. We are exhorted in Romans to be transformed by the renewing
of your mind (Romans 12:2).
In the Psalms
we are given more wonderful promises for spending time in God's Word:
Blessed is the man who walketh not in the
counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the
seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law
doth he meditate day and night. And he
shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth its
fruit in its season; its leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth
shall prosper. Psalms 1:1-3
We are not
only to spend quality time in the Word meditating on it and memorizing
scripture, but we need to also put our faith into action. It is not just enough to go to church and
hear the minister tell us how to live the Christian life. We need to take seriously what he or she has
to say to us and immediately apply it to our lives. In the book of James we are instructed to
apply the Word of God to our lives or we will have a superficial form of
religion that will lack credibility because there will be no evidence of God's
power at work in us.
But be ye doers of the word
and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the
word, and not a doer, he is like a man beholding his natural face in a mirror:
for he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and immediately forgetteth what
manner of man he was. But whosoever looketh into the perfect law of liberty,
and continueth in it, he being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work,
this man shall be blessed in his deed. James
1:22-25.
According to James, in order to live the Christian
life we need to be disciplined. Twice he
mentions that we are liable to forget if all we do is listen. Three times he mentions "doing"
which suggests action on our part. So we
need the daily discipline of spending time with God.
Taken from VictoryOver Backsliding,
by Linda McBurney-Gunhouse, Creative Focus Publishing, p. 65-66, 2007.
NOTE: If you decide to purchase the entire ebook, and you will gain a much greater insight
into this topic. God bless you as you
pursue a closer walk with Him.
In
the next blog, we are going to look at an extremely important topic having to
do with how or whether we are in the habit of correctly interpreting
Scripture. Please don’t miss this next one.
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