Emptying Yourself – The Spirit of Surrender - Purity 1380

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.com or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of my canine pal Harley leading the way down the recently blacktopped stretch of Waite Road under the bright sunshine of a new day comes to us from yours truly as I captured this scene during our morning walk last Saturday. Well, it's Thursday and I send this blacktop pathway photo as a visual reminder and encouragement to get on or to stay on the path of Christian discipleship by establishing, developing, and maintaining a daily spiritual practice that includes gratitude, meditation on the Word of God, and prayer. A newly discovered John Bunyan quote reminds us that prayer will make a man cease from sin, or sin will entice a man to cease from prayer. Bunyan's quote drives home the point that if we aren't going to God in prayer regularly, Our battle to become more like Jesus will be hindered by sin, missing the mark of becoming the people that God created us to be. We are either going to live for and with God, or we are going to live by and for ourselves. You can't really follow Jesus on your own. You have to meet with Him, and God the Father, and the Holy Spirit through regular interactions, conversations. Prayer, where we not only report on our progress and confess our faults and ask for strength, but where we also listen for His guidance and surrender to His will for our lives. So which are you doing more of, praying or sinning? The answer to that— this question can say a lot, particularly if you ascribe to a sinner saved by grace mentality rather than accepting your identity in Christ as a saint. Some Christians with a checkered past will fail to fully accept the new life that they have received from Christ and balk at any suggestion that they are a saint, regardless of their behavior. They, they know what they did in the past, and because of guilt, shame, or fear, will not say they are a saint because they either believe they would be a hypocrite for saying so, or that their admission of sainthood would immediately lead to their downfall. But the Word of God, the New Testament epistles, calls the followers of Jesus saints who are in Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae, etc., not sinners. And the sooner we accept who we are in Christ, the sooner we'll be able to live out the freedom that the Son has given us. And the way we can do that is through surrender. The whole M.t. Clark motif For the blog and podcast is based on the spirit of surrender, the emptying of ourselves to be filled with the Holy Spirit to become the people God created us to be. Just as Jesus emptied himself of his divine attributes to take on the form of man, we are to empty ourselves to be bondservants to the will of God and to take on the likeness of Jesus. The Get Used to Different student guide by The Chosen team touches on the spirit of surrender, and I'm surrendered to the idea of sharing what they wrote to remind us, or to help us, to surrender to the life Jesus has for us. And so The Chosen team, uh, writes: accepting the Lord's invitation meant Nathanael would have to give up on his— give up his own plans and dreams. He would have to turn over his deep-seated desires along with his beliefs about what what would make him happy. Nathanael had to surrender. Ironically, when he did, he found the same freedom God offers you: freedom from the relentless drive to have everything go your own way; freedom from the need— from needing the approval of others; freedom from insatiable desires like pride, greed, vanity, and lust; freedom from your self-centered nature; and the sin it breeds in your life. When we choose to surrender, we're in good company because Jesus lived his entire life with the same attitude. Jesus did not count equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a bondservant. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, death on a cross. Philippians 2:6-8 and he's the one we follow. Today's spiritual exercise will help you take baby steps down the path of following Jesus into a life of surrender. What you'll do is super simple and only takes a few seconds, but there's a catch, because simple doesn't mean easy. Surrendering never is. Nevertheless, sit up and place your hands on your knees. Make fists with your hands. Now close your eyes. Well, you might want to do this after— after you want to finish reading this first. And you can take a deep breath. As you exhale, turn your fists over and open them, and then say this line from the Lord's Prayer: Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. There's nothing magical about those words, and they won't act It won't automatically change your desires, but you're learning to turn things over to God. You're posturing yourself on the outside in the same way you'll need to posture your heart, because following Jesus means you'll have to entrust your dreams to him. So pray this prayer as you, as you unball your fists and begin the process of surrender. Pray: Father, I'm hanging on to my dreams so tightly. There are some things even now that I don't really want to surrender to you. Help me learn to let go. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give me the strength to mean it, Lord. Amen. I just love how the Chosen team, uh, And The Chosen series has introduced people to the Gospels in a new way, and how the material they produce are geared, or is geared, to directing new believers to be followers of Jesus, to be disciples, to learn from Jesus with a spirit of surrender, to be his apprentices and to learn from him. I know there can be objections to the artistic license that The Chosen series takes at times, but their resources show that they aren't trying to make Jesus more palatable for a wider audience. Their materials are inviting their viewers to be authentic followers of Jesus, following him into repentance and surrendering their will for his. So check out the, uh, Get Used to Different Chosen Student Guide. If you need some basic guidance to get you started, or just pick up the source material, the Bible, and begin your surrender to the Lord by developing a daily spiritual practice where you can walk and talk with him. Today's Bible verse comes to us from this Quick Scripture Reference Book for Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation verse comes from the section on divorce. And today's verse is Romans 12:18 from the New Living Translation. The word of God says, "Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone." Today's verse is the first of three passages of scripture that fall under the ninth point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on divorce. And that ninth point is the believing spouse must seek reconciliation when trouble arises. Today's verse is a good instruction for all our relationships as Christians, and thus it should be remembered and practiced in our marriages, troubled or not. Gary Thomas's book Sacred Marriage suggests that marriage was God's gift to us, uh, not necessarily to make us happy as much as a way he can make us holy. Marriages are the close relationship where we can't hide our worst selves.— and where we will continually come into conflict with our spouse and, and their different desires, ideas, and preferences for living. And so, out of love for our spouse and love for God, we should consider having a servant's heart toward our spouses and surrender our own desires for what is best for our marriage and our spouse and to establish peace. Today's verse tells us to do all that we can to live at peace with everyone. Everyone starts at home, and so we should do all we can to have peace in our marriages. As always, I invite all to go to mtforchrist.com, where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from According to Your Word: Morning and Evening Through the New Testament by Stephen F. Allford.. And today, um, Alford always prompts us to read a chapter of scripture. Today's chapter is 1 Corinthians 7, and from chapter 7, he shares a portion of verse 24, which says, Brethren, let each one remain with God in that state in which he was called. And Stephen Alford writes, here is a message to my own heart: find contentment in the things I have and the ministry to which He has called me. This requires patience, for very often my calling requires waiting periods. Oh, to know the truth of the words: "They also serve who only stand and wait." This calling also requires consistency. It is so easy to be spasmodic in Christian service, especially when circumstances lend themselves to extra efforts. But to be consistent and patient necessitates God. Hence the apostle says, 'Remain with God' . 'If God is for us, who can be against us?' . No wonder Moses said, 'If your presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here' . And Alfred ends by praying, 'Teach me, Lord, to be content with such things as I have, and in the vocation wherewith I am called. Amen. Amen. Yeah, one of the principles of our faith is contentment. You know, that's the 'I can do all things in Christ' verse that we love so much. Really talks about contentment. It means, you know, we can do all things whether they are good or bad. We can endure all things, really, is where Paul is leading us in that verse. Even though it sounds like a rallying cry to do the miraculous, and we can do the miraculous, you know, if we try, you know, or at least, you know, I don't know about the miraculous, but how about the unconventional things we didn't think were possible within ourselves, you know, things we didn't think we were capable of doing, things that we gave up on long ago, um, in our own strength. But with Christ, you can overcome and you can accomplish things that you never thought possible. But that's where the spirit of surrender comes in. We have to surrender to his will. Um, you know, I never thought it was possible to be free from drugs and alcohol. I was never going to do it in my own strength. It was only through my faith, you know, and leaning on the strength of God and his guidance and following, you know, following him that, uh, that I'm free today. I never would have known it without Jesus. I would never would have known it without the leading of the Holy Spirit and the Word of God and God the Father hearing my prayers. Um, this is why we, um, podcast. This is why we blog. He, you know, my message is pretty simple: seek the Lord. And you do that, and one way you do that is through a daily spiritual practice, me, you know, dedicating the first part of your day, rising early, you know, if necessary, which it usually is, to read the Word of God, to pray, and to, you know, talk to him, and to remind yourself who you are in Christ. Christ. That's always something I do. I always recite the, uh, the Who I Am in Christ list. Basically, that's, that's available at ficm.org, uh, you know, basically. And it's been on the blog before, so you can always search Who I Am in Christ. I'm pretty sure you'll find it. Um, but it's a free resource at ficm.org, basically under their free resource verses, you'll see Who I Am in Christ list. It's a simple list of declarations based on the Word of God that tell us that we're accepted, significant, and secure in Christ. And if these things are true about us, there's no room for condemnation, negative thoughts, depression, anger, you know. If we live in the truth of who we are in Christ, we won't consider ourselves a sinner. We'll know that we're a saint. In fact, that's one of the declarations on the list. Why? Because it's difficult to accept the new life we have in Christ. We just want to beat ourselves up. Some people don't accept the forgiveness of God really on a heart level and spend their lives in condemnation, and, and they don't repent. They, they stay the way they are. They haven't surrendered to the, to the will of the Lord and haven't repented. The only way you repent is to surrender. Otherwise, your best efforts at trying to improve yourself or stop sinning just aren't going to work. You'll do it for a while and you get more frustrated. A lot of Christians have done this and given up. And like Bunyan's quote said, you know, they'll cease praying, you know, because they'll think their prayers aren't answered. They don't think God's there. You know, but the way we establish harmony with God and a deep relationship with Him is to seek Him by being real in our efforts to know His word and to talk to Him on a continual basis and to trust even the things we can't see and to accept even the hard things in life, knowing that the Lord is with us and that He moves all things together for good. And that good might be you going to heaven someday. Meaning it could be a rough life, but we walk in— walk with him, we'll experience the peace, joy, and love that he has for us despite the circumstances that surround us. So we encourage a lifestyle of Christian discipleship, and resources in regard to that are available at our, our website and our YouTube channel. M.t. for Christ— M.t. for Christ dot com is the website and M.t. for Christ 247 is the YouTube channel and the podcast for that matter. But yeah, and when we just speak about what we know, we know what God did in our lives, and we, we don't think we're very special other than the fact that we, we listened and followed when he called us, and he called us out of the darkness, and we're going to keep following him because even though we, you know, yea, though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death more than once, God never left us, and he's led us to a good place. And we know that, uh, you know, the suffering isn't necessarily over. Our lives will, you know, go into— will progress. We will age, and unless Jesus shows up, we will die. But If we should die, we shall live. So that's some hard truth. But the higher truth that can give us peace over the things of this world is the fact that Christ died for us and gave us eternal life, and that He has a place for us in eternity, and He will return to reclaim the earth. And, you know, there's heaven and then there's the new earth. And, you know, so It's some exciting times in our future. You know, granted, life on Earth might be a little, you know, on the downward trend, but, uh, on the other side of eternity, uh, it's all, it's all upswing. It's going to be an amazing adventure. I can't even— we can't conceive of it. Um, you know, it boggles the mind. Christ is going to return and rule for a thousand years, and then, uh, there will be a new heaven and earth. So there's a lot more, a more our futures than we think. Something to hold on to, something to remember. But we can, we can have peace right now when we walk with God on a continual basis. So as I say, keep on walking and talking with God. Well, we have to keep on walking and talking to God to our day job. Um, you know, the Lord hasn't blessed my ministry with riches, which is fine, but that means I just have to to support myself, um, the best I can. And, uh, not very good at that, but, but the Lord is gracious and my employer is gracious, um, and they provide for my needs. So we have to, uh, honor them by showing up on time and doing what we're supposed to and doing the best job we can. So let's pray and we'll get to that. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for the freedom you've given us, for the joy you give us, for the peace you've given us, because we know you're with us and you've helped us greatly. And although we struggle at times with certain things, we know that we're accepted by you and that if we follow you, we can accomplish great things and, uh, experience new levels of freedom, Lord. Um, and Enjoy your peace and presence all the way, knowing there's no condemnation for us. Lord, we pray for anyone who's listening or reading today's message, that they'd be blessed, um, and that you'd come alongside them and their prayer requests. And, uh, Lord, while you're at it, we're also praying for you to go before us today. Um, we want you to open our eyes to things you want us to see and lead us in the way we should go, because all we want to do is represent you and your kingdom here on Earth. Point other people to you, to lead them in the way they should go. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.