How's Your Soul?
Brad Reiches
Aug 31 2006 12:23AM
Brad Reiches
Aug 31 2006 12:23AM
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Thursday, August 31, 2006
GodThoughtsWired!
GodThoughtsWired!
"How's Your Soul?"
"Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain
from fleshly lusts which wage war against your soul."
"Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain
from fleshly lusts which wage war against your soul."
1 Peter 2:11
On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate you "peace-level?" If someone were to ask you today, "How is it with your soul?" What would you say? Jesus said, "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden and I will give you rest" (see Matthew 11:28-30). Have you come to Him? Do you know the "rest" that Jesus refers to? Do you abide in it?
Until you choose to follow the Lord your God, fully, you will never know such "peace" and "rest." Caleb followed the Lord "fully," and entered the promised land as a result (see Joshua, chapter 14). God chose Noah because He knew that Noah would follow Him "fully" (see Genesis 6:22).
David was a magnificent example of this concept! God called him "a man after My own heart" and then explained, "I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after My heart, who will do ALL my will" (Acts 13:22, caps and bold mine). Indeed, David is a marvelous example of the invitation to follow God:
Until you choose to follow the Lord your God, fully, you will never know such "peace" and "rest." Caleb followed the Lord "fully," and entered the promised land as a result (see Joshua, chapter 14). God chose Noah because He knew that Noah would follow Him "fully" (see Genesis 6:22).
David was a magnificent example of this concept! God called him "a man after My own heart" and then explained, "I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after My heart, who will do ALL my will" (Acts 13:22, caps and bold mine). Indeed, David is a marvelous example of the invitation to follow God:
NOT IN PERFECTION
(THAT'S WHY CHRIST DIED),
(THAT'S WHY CHRIST DIED),
BUT IN WILLINGNESS.
Here's a "secret" that I'll be elaborating on in future editions of GodThoughtsWired! "David did what was right in the sight of the Lord, and had not turned aside from anything that He commanded him all the days of his life, except in the case of Uriah the Hittite" (1 Kings 15:5). Indeed, David followed the Lord his God fully, all the days of his life, not in perfection (remember Bathsheba), but in willingness. As such, David knew the "peace of God" as few men have ever known...EXCEPT during the season of his sin.
"When I (David) kept silent about my sin,
my body wasted away...My vitality was
drained away as with the fever heat of summer."
Psalm 32:3-4
my body wasted away...My vitality was
drained away as with the fever heat of summer."
Psalm 32:3-4
Anything less than wholehearted submission (see 2 Chronicles 25:2) to the will and word of God, will result in unrest, inner turmoil and discontentment. Why? Because sin, in all its forms (see above) wages war against the soul. Until you come to the place of 100% willingness in your walk with the Lord, you will never fully know, understand, and experience the rest and peace that Jesus came to give (see John 14:27).
It only took me thirty-eight years to learn this lesson.
How 'bout you?
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