Today’s Reading: Mark 8:31-38
How serious Jesus is about following the will of God and not our own!
I pray for God’s will often, but to be quite honest, I am not always listening when he is guiding me. I know that Peter was thinking that he was doing the right thing and that he thought he was just standing up for Jesus, the one whom he loved deeply, but Jesus rebuked him harshly by even referring to his words as coming from Satan.
So what am I thinking? I am thinking that we have to get extremely serious with God and his will for our lives. I say that I want to do his will, but am I doing it? How do I know I am right where he wants me to be? Sometimes I know without a doubt that what I am doing is the definite will of God, but then other times I am not real sure. Am I saying the right words? Am I writing the right words? Am I leading others to Christ just by the way I live my life? Living in this world is not getting any easier, in fact, it gets harder everyday. Satan and all his demons are running around attacking everyone and trying to cause as much chaos for us Christians as he possibly can. I have days when I get so discouraged, let me rephrase that and be perfectly honest…there are days when I get down right angry at how we humans treat each other. And although it bothers me deeply, it also reminds me of the way in which we should treat each other. God created us to worship and love him, and if we truly love him than we will automatically love one another. I don’t know about you, but that last sentence got me---think about it, if we truly love him we will love others? So if we don’t love others, we don’t love Him?
Alright, well I had to stop a minute and look up some scriptures on loving one another. I know for a while now I have been saying it is all about love, but today I realized just how much. At first I thought I was getting off the topic of God’s will and moving onto the subject of love, but then I realized that his will is love and the following scriptures just confirm this.
I John 4:7-8 Dear friends let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
I John 3:15-16 Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him. This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.
John 13:34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
So what am I thinking now? God’s will may not always be what we think, it may not mean that he moves us to a new place, it may not mean a different job, it may not mean a different church, it may not mean that we will discover some kind of God given talent. God’s will may mean that we stay right where we have been placed and just love! If you are finding it difficult to love those around you, then maybe that is where God needs you to be, maybe that is your mission field. Maybe, just maybe, God has placed you in a difficult place with difficult people to share his love with them. Here’s a thought, what if I quit wanting everyone around me to change and I start changing myself by loving them for who they are and let God change them and me in the process of loving them.
Just like Jesus said in verses 34-36, “if anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul?" God’s will does not change, but our will has to conform to his will no matter what we think or want---there is no other way! We have to give him our life and live it for him, and I am here to tell you that what I have experienced so far with Jesus is so much greater than anything I have ever known.
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