Practicing or Professing?
Psalm 5:1-3 (TPT) Listen, Yahweh, to my passionate prayer! Can’t you hear my groaning? Don’t you hear how I’m crying out to you? My King and my God, consider my every word, for I am calling out to you. At each and every sunrise you will hear my voice as I prepare my sacrifice of prayer to you. Every morning I lay out the pieces of my life on the altar and wait for your fire to fall upon my heart.
Are you allowing the fire of God to fall upon your heart? In other words, are you seeking to know Your Creator and asking for Him to remove (burn off) everything in you that is not pleasing to Him? Are you willing to come to Him in repentance for wrong doing? Or are you looking for someone to tell you your sins are okay and that God will understand? Don't you know God knows you more than anyone else? He even knows your thoughts!
Are you a practicing Christian or just a professing Christian? Imagine your children always telling people how much they love you yet when everyone else is no longer around they never want to spend time with you. They prefer to eat alone and talk with their friends rather than family. Wouldn't that grieve you? Having your children before you yet they completely ignore your existence. You are just there to provide housing and food. Parents have so much more to offer their children - they are not ATM's and taxi services. They are here to nurture, guide, counsel, cry with, and correct us for our own protection and well-being.
Our Heavenly Father is the absolute greatest parent and He wants to spend time with us! Oh how great His heart must be grieved to have so many children walk away from Him and even deny Him. As if the work on the cross was just a nice gesture. This is a call for the body of Christ to rise up against mediocrity and stand up for Christ! No more being lukewarm or half-hearted in your time, gifts, talents and resources. When you sit at church or listen to podcasts, really lean in - pastors are pouring into the lives of their congregations in efforts to help the people grow closer to God and learn more about who He is but they cannot babysit you to ensure you are doing your part.
I have felt like a broken-record many times when learning someone I have ministered to for years has literally done nothing on their own to grow closer to God. Attending church services will not fulfill your spiritual needs. Church services are experiences for us to rejoice and get filled up even more after we have spent the week pouring out and seeking the Lord for ourselves. Ask yourself this - why do I go to church? Is it for the programs? Is it to serve? Is it to just socialize and boast about yourself?
If Jesus walked into your house today, what would He find? Would He be pleased? Our time on earth must be spent on purpose. We are all on a mission - are you succeeding? No more procrastinating, no more laziness, no more self-centeredness - you are called, you are loved, you are chosen, you are more than a conqueror - go out and reach the lost! Do great things for God - step out in faith, knowing He will be with you. Love, love, love on people. Amen.
Hebrews 6:10-11 (TPT) For God, the Faithful One, is not unfair. How can he forget the work you have done for him? He remembers the love you demonstrate as you continually serve his beloved ones for the glory of his name. But we long to see you passionately advance until the end and you find your hope fulfilled.
