photo courtesy of Thomas Hawk
I want to learn more about the God I worship. I want to know more about Jesus Christ. About the Holy Spirit. I want to KNOW them… personally. Not just someone else’s idea or description of them. Not a pastor’s greek translation of them. I want to know the true God, the living God, the eternal King.
In the bible, God speaks clearly to His followers. I want Him to speak clearly to me.
I think that I am slowly catching on to the fact that He DOES speak clearly. I just need to learn how to listen. And part of listening to God has a lot to do with belonging.
With most things, there is either a choice to belong or their isn’t. My wallet doesn’t choose to belong to me. Nor does my car. However, I might choose to belong to something… like a gym or a club.
Like many confusing things about the trinitarian God, belonging to Him is kind of a “both/and” situation. On the one hand, “Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” Or as it is stated more bluntly in Deuteronomy: “To the Lord your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it.” It all belongs to Him.
But in spite of that, there is a choice.
“But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.”
Joshua 24:15
Every day, ever minute, I have a choice. Do I belong, am I owned by God? Or am I owned by my email client, my blackberry, the latest sports scores, my job, my hobbies.
Is my prayer time distracted by thoughts of these other things, or is everything I do interrupted and infused with prayer?
“He who belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”
John 8:47
Who do you belong to?
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5 comments on "Who do you belong to?"
1
I definitely used to belong to the world and the things of this world. Even though I knew God, I never really KNEW God. I say that quite often because there is a major difference and I’m sure you’d agree.
Now I belong totally to my Father and His Son Jesus Christ, who IS my brother. I’m not perfect at it because of old habits. Meaning, there are times that I still try to accomplish “things” on my own, often failing miserably. But, I find that with..um..practice(??) that it get’s easier and easier to turn and say, “God, what do you think?” It’s the listening that I quite enjoy and I wish I could tell you how to listen.
What I often do is before I go to bed instead of talking to God, I’ll say, “God, I think I’ll just listen tonight.” and then I will meditate and try to listen. Like anything else, this too takes practice, but the rewards are out of this world, literally.
2
Thanks Scott. Often times, I think I say that “I don’t know how” to listen as an excuse for the fact that I don’t take time to listen.
And I think “practice” is an appropriate word. Oswald Chambers calls it “abandonment”.
Practicing to let go of the need to own and control and know.
3
Kyle Steed just posted an entry on choice as well.
Same idea, different angle… and probably better written, hehe.
Check it out!
4
I love what you said here:
“Not just someone else’s idea or description of them.”
Knowing God is something new everyday, and I think that is wonderful. However, we must choose Him every morning because it’s so easy to take one step out of bed and be overwhelmed with 100 different emotions.
So I know I always belong to Christ, nothing can separate me from His love. But when I take my focus off of Jesus then I can easily get confused with who I belong to.
Thanks for sharing.
5
Thanks Kyle. I’ve been so wrapped up in church “stuff” lately that it’s easy to think “hey, it’s church, it must be focused on Christ!”
But that is far from true.
Like you said in your blog post… sometimes we need to step outside.
-Mike