He who has a Why to live for can bear with almost any Hows….

ED started today’s plan presentation with this little devotional thought. I simply needs to put this down.

“Where are you?” This is God’s first question to mankind (see Gen 3:9). God is not concern of who we are….our identity. He is not concern with what we have done…….our security. He is not concern what we need to do….our purpose. He is concern with where we are…….our position or location. In another words, He is concern with the position of our journey with Him and also where He has placed us in our journey with Him.

Our identity is clear…..we are His children and His beloved. Our security is clear……we are saved and redeemed not because of what we have done but in His finished work on the cross. Our purpose is clear….to make disciples of all nations. But are we clear where we are? The place that the Lord has placed us is His very purpose for us.

After 1 year in TCS, I am beginning to see why the Lord has has placed me in SAF for the past 10 years and also why He has led me here. It is still a journey. But I begin to see that where He has placed me at different juncture or phases of my life has its exact purpose for me. Sometimes we fight and ask God to show us His purpose and move us to place where we can serve Him and know Him. However, where we are is exactly the place He has purpose and where He wants us to serve. As ED shared, where He has placed us is a place of faith, freedom and fruitfulness. I begin to understand what Paul wrote now in Phil 4:11 “Not that I speak from want; for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.” Because in whatever place he was, he has the faith, freedom and frutifulness in all that he does. He can say that he is contented, because he know where he is.

Do you know where are you now? 

The call to Christianity is a call to discipleship. However, many a time, the call to Christianity has turned much into a fanfare of love and grace with all the lovey-dovey messages. Yes, no doubt, the gospel of our salvation is all about the love and grace of our Lord Jesus, however, it is not just about that.

Jesus is very clear about His good news for us.  He reminded that the greatest commandment is to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind, this is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbour as yourself.” (Matt 22:37-39, NIV). He also pointed out that “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:27, NASB). What He implied is that, to follow Him, i.e. to embrace Christianty, is about loving and this love is an active love which require sacrifice, a sacrifce to the point of death (carry the cross). And how then shall we love?

When we love someone, or something, or some activities, it is never passive. We don’t just say that we love someone or something, we act upon it! We would try to spend time with the object of our love, please them, pamper them and to a certain extent we would even be consumed by them. However, in the course of our faith, we have always seek to be at the receiving end in our relationship with the Lord. Yes, the Lord doesn’t require us to “do” things for Him, however, He desires us to love him. And to love Him, we need to be “active” in our love for Him.

To love Him actively, we have to acknowledge the cross and to carry it daily i.e. bearing the cost of discipleship. Christ has not called us to simply be His follower but to be His disciple where we are to perpetuate His work, proclaim His kingdom and to disciple all nations in His ways. To acknowledge the cross and to carry it daily, I propose that we have to simply “Rearrange our activities so that we can bring upon the focus of His presence and purpose daily in our lives (Love the Lord and carry our cross daily). Thereafter,  bringing a renewal of our passion for those around us (Loving our neighbours)”.

It calls for us to first take the active step to surrender our will and our desires. I believe, even as we take this step, He who has given us “heaven’s best” will not short change us but will “grant us our hearts desires” as we “seek first His kingdom and righteousness”.

 Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. . . . I have called you friends . . . —John 15:13, 15

“Will you lay down your life?” To lay down one’s life literally mean to lose your life or in another words “to die”. Many a times, we simply take this literally and proclaim that “we will die for Jesus”. Oswald Chamber highlighted that “It is much easier to die than to lay down your life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling of God.” Dying, to many of us, is a distant thing. And to many of us, dying is defintely a better deal for it allows us to get away from this world, its suffering, its unjustice, its pain….for even Paul put it that “For to me to live is Chrsit and to die is gain” Phip 1:21.

However, I believed that God doesn’t want us to die for Him, but He simply wants us to “lay down our life” for Him. What does it mean to “lay down our life” and not yet die physically per se? I believe that this “laying down” involves the surrendering of our will, our rights, our ambitions, our wants and our desires for the purpose and the glory of our Lord. This will require us to readjust our lifestyle, renew our mind and also to reprioritise our time and activities. This I foresee is harder than simply proclaiming that “we will die for Jesus” for those are simply words and none of us here (except for maybe a few) can really testify and  indeed have a close brush with death to truly understand what is means “to die”.

“Salvation is easy for us, because it cost God so much. But the exhibiting of salvation in my life is difficult. God saves a person, fills him with the Holy Spirit, and then says, in effect, “Now you work it out in your life, and be faithful to Me, even though the nature of everything around you is to cause you to be unfaithful.”" Oswald Chamber

Will you lay down your life for Him who called you Friends?

“Let your roots grow down into him and draw up nourishment from him, so that you will grow in faith, strong and vigorous in the truth you were taught. Let your lives overflow with thanksgiving for all he has done.” Col 2:7 (NLT)

Sometimes, we wonder what does it mean to grow deep? The scripture is clear. To grow deep is to grow deep and “down” in Christ and “draw up nourishment from him”. Sometime, we think too much. We wonder and ask, “What do we need to do?”, “What must we do?” etc……but to grow deep is simply to grow deep in Him i.e. getting to know Jesus more. Through the sermons in the church, through our personal time, through our reading of the bible, through our prayers, through our listening to His voice………its simply to rearrange our acitivities so that we can spend time with Him. It is not easy, but it’s going to worth all the efforts.

So what happen when we grow deep in him? Well, we will grow in faith…..”faith comes by the hearing of His words” (Rom 10:17, paraphrase mine) …..and also as a result…”stong and vigorous in the truth”, aka the word of God (“Thy word is truth” Jn 17:17). To grow deep, to know Christ and to be founded in the word ARE ALL LINKED!!! Let’s not separate them as we have, but to see them as one and all the same……