A Life Worthy

You, my brothers, were called to be free.  But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature… (Galatians 5:13).

Paul has been hammering us with the fact that you can’t earn your salvation; it is the gift of a gracious God.  There are no magic words, no sacred rituals, no self-sacrifice or noble deeds that can replace what Jesus did for you on the cross.  You are free from all that.

And yet

There is danger in freedom.  How easy it can be, once we have grasped the basics of our freedom in Christ, to run headlong from legalism, right past liberty, and on into license.  

Once upon a time, I had a job that occasionally involved driving a golf cart.

Details will be withheld to protect the guilty.

Anyway, the carts had regulators on the carburetors  that prevented you from driving faster than the proverbial snail.  One lovely day, a coworker discovered how to remove said regulators, and we discovered that these little carts were capable of rather astounding speeds.

We did not handle our newfound liberty well.

But when liberty gives way to license, destruction is not far behind.  

In life

or a golf cart

or your walk with God

Be free, Beloved.  But be safe.

Happy Thursday. 

Brothers and sisters, if I am still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? (Galatians 5:11)

Good point.

Paul was fighting against his culture, and it was fighting back.

Nothing much has changed.  Beloved,  if we are men and women of God, we are called to stand against both the depravity of the world and the pseudoreligious legalism of some in the Church.  There will be push-back.  As much as we are called to live at peace with those around us, we cannot and must not “go along to get along.”

Are you prepared to fight, Beloved?  Are you willing to stake your claim on biblical truth, and hold your ground against all comers?  It won’t be pretty…but then neither was the cross.

We aren’t called to pretty.

We’re called to truth.

Stand firm, Beloved.

Happy Tuesday.

A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough (Galatians 5:9).

Remember the I Love Lucy episode where  Lucy decided to bake her own bread?  

You don’t?  Friend, you need to spend a little quality time researching that!  Anyway, there is an episode in which Lucy wants to do things the old fashioned way, and she figures she’ll make her own bread from scratch.  She gets confused as to how much yeast she should use, so she just dumps some in.  The yeast does it’s yeasty-thing, and the bread begins to rise.

And rise.

At some point Lucy opens the oven door and is attacked by a loaf the size of a 1972 Country Squire station wagon.

Trust me, that’s big.

It didn’t seem like a lot of yeast, but the results were devastating.

Those ideas that get into your head from, well, wherever–they seem so small.  But they’ve got a way of working through the dough of your spirit and causing a whole lot of damage.

You should pray more.

You should give more.

You should serve more.

You should do more.

You should be more.

So small, these thoughts–but so potent.

Sweep out the yeast, Beloved.

Happy Friday.

You were running a good race.  Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth? (Galatians 5:7)

Good question, Beloved.  Time for just a tad of self-analysis today.  Those thoughts that tell you you’re not good enough, smart enough, godly enough, blah blah blah enough…where are they coming from?  Who puts them into your head?  

I ran track in high school.  My coach used to say that each of us should run his own race, not constantly changing pace or strategy because of what the other runners were doing.  Wise advice–made good sense.  But sometimes another runner would cut in on you, throw off your stride.  It was so easy to forget the race you knew you should run and start chasing the other guy.  

Usually didn’t work, by the way.

Run your own race today, Beloved.  He’s got the course marked; you know what to do.

Happy Wednesday.

But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope (Galatians 5:5).

One day

the weakness

the sinfulness

the foolishness

the laziness

the blindness

the fleshiness

will be gone

“poof”

like that.

The Son will rise, and all that is not of Him will burn off like the morning mist, and we will be what and how and who He called us to be.

At last.

Today, Beloved?

Oh, let it be!

Amen.  Come quickly, Lord Jesus.

Happy Monday, Beloved.