This post is going to be a bit of a confession...
So yesterday I read a sentence in My Utmost for His Highest and it completely blew me away, here it is: Christian workers fail because they place their desire for their own holiness above their desire to know God. It blew me away because that has been me! I realized that, lately maybe even for awhile I have been desiring my own holiness/godliness more the I desired God.
God revealing this to me was not a fun thing to realize. I mean of all the things I thought I was doing, of course desiring God was one of them! I mean you can't "do" all the christian things and be a part of different ministries and not desire God...right? Don't get me wrong it wasn't like I haven't cared for God at all or that he wasn't a part of anything I am doing. I am just saying for me, my focus was on my ability for godliness. That I cared more for my own holiness then to truly know and desire my God.
I am still working this out and getting to know the core of where this started. But these are a few questions i've asked myself to understand the difference of: Desiring God and desiring to be godly? (Now I know the one follows the other when actually living it out but just hear me out of the other side of things)
What are my intentions on being godly?
-is it for my own selfishness to be made known?
-am I trying to be godly by my own doing, by the "what" I can do?
-do I really desire to make God be known? (by my godliness)
What I have been seeing is that I have been doing it backwards...working on my godliness then trying to put God within that. On a bigger picture, its like starting a church based on what the culture is like, on what the people are attracted to, what will make the majority happy, what the building should look like, etc... with out first looking to God and asking him "What kind of church does this city need?" They have enough of "play" churches, they need Me(God)!
People don't need Nicole, they need Jesus.
-Nicole B
Please feel free to comment and give insight. Would appreciate your prayers as I continue to work this out in my life! :)
We all go through this Nicole so don't be alarmed! When our worlds become seemingly hectic and busy its easy to lose sight of desiring God when we are trying to take care of our own crazy lives. But we must remember, God is meant to be the motivation and hope of everything we do. Each and everyone of us has to slow down sometimes and remember that we can take care of ourselves while ALSO desiring God. It takes sometime to master but it is possible. Sometimes we can slip up and realize we have only focused on ourselves but as long as we realize that and change it then all is good! :) Love you!
ReplyDeletein 1982, after realizing that all the years arguing with people about spiritual gifts may have been wasted time, I pushed the books away from me and prayed "God, I don't want to follow men anymore. All I want is all of You". That was probably the most dangerous prayer I could have spoken. Since then I have learned a second prayer. "God take me on. Don't let me be stuck in one place" (growth wise, not geography). Those 2 prayers have taken me on some incredible journeys, to a bunch of different people and countries, and also given me a real bug to shun anything that even remotely smells of legalism. Personal holiness is a natural outgrowth of falling more in love with the Father, Jesus, the Spirit. The more in love, the more you want to please Him, the holier you become. It's like becoming stronger. You don't become stronger by reading about it, but by eating right and exercise. My observation? I don't know about the holiness part, because that is deeply personal and not always what you see from the outside, but as far as falling in love with the Father I think you're doing just fine. Keep doing that, and the rest will take care of itself.
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