United with Christ - A Healthy Spirit-filled Life

 

As Born Again Believers, we are filled throughout our entire body, soul and spirit with all of God’s fullness. We possess the richest measure of His divine presence within us and we are wholly filled and flooded to overflowing with God Himself (Ephesians 3:16-19, Amplified Bible).

We are united with Christ in the very spiritual fiber of our being (Hebrews 4:12). He provides us with everything we need to live a healthy, Spirit-filled life.

Then, His Spirit infiltrates the joints of our soul – our thoughts, choices and emotions - to operate on our carnality while He plants His fruit within us (Hebrews 4:12).

Paul counted all of his worldly possessions and gain as lost when compared to the joy of his salvation and the riches he received from intimately knowing Christ (Philippians 3:7-11).

God gives this same resurrection life to lost sinners who humble themselves and surrender their life to Him (John 19:10-11). We are liberated from living in this earthly realm, even though we physically continue to dwell here (Galatians 2:20).

In this same way, we detach from our connection to this world, even the good parts of life, which hinder our walk with God, such as extended family, houses and lands – in order to obtain the better blessings provided for us by Christ in us (Luke 14:23-33; Philippians 3:10).

We realize that even the worst of adversity in our life ultimately comes from God to perfect our soul and to provide for us everything that we need to live Godly in Christ Jesus (Hebrews 11:32-34; Job 1:8, 2:3).

Prayer:

Father God, we knock on doors and invite our neighbors to church. We pray for them and for everyone You bring to our mind. We listen to Your Spirit and obey His promptings throughout our day. We shed Your light within us for all the world around us to see, so they may live with us in eternity as the redeemed of the Lord (Psalm 107:2).

You bore our sins in Your body on the cross; so that we too can die to sin and live righteously and victoriously, just as You did (1 Peter 2:24). You take priority in our heart over all other aspects of life (1 Corinthians 9:22). We give You all the praise and glory and honor due Your name (Psalm 96:8).

Thought for the Day:

God elected us as His holy and saintly priests, because we are His special possession created to declare His praises to a lost and dying world around us. - 1 Peter 2:9

Yoked With Jesus

Jesus told us to take His yoke on us and He would give us rest (Matthew 29:29-30). Picture a wooden yoke hooking two oxen together to pull a load.

One oxen alone bears all the burden, but two oxen share the weight and make the load lighter. Alone in this world without Christ in our life, we are not fully alive, because our spirit is dead in sin (Ephesians 2:1-5). We barely make it and even our success is hollow and meaningless.

If we are yoked with Jesus, He carries the full brunt of the load on His shoulders. The shared yoke also keeps us in step with Jesus as we traverse life (Galatians 5:16, 25). We are never alone again.

We have no worries or fears because our sin nature is dead, and our life is hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3, Romans 6:5; 1 Corinthians 6:17). Paul learned this lesson when God used him mightily even while imprisoned (Acts 16:16-40).

Like Paul, we too can keep our focus on Christ in us (Romans 6; 2 Corinthians 11:23-12:10). Paul considered the loss of his human achievements as trivial when compared to the joy of serving the Lord (Philippians 3:9).

We can make it the goal of our day to feast on God's Word in order to feed our spirit, to nurture our soul with spiritually beneficial activities and to sustain our body with wholesome foods.

Yoked with Jesus our burdens lighten, our worries diminish, our fears vanish and our faith in His faithfulness increases. This intimate union nourishes every part of our being through every moment of our day.

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, You invite us to yoke up with You and to permit You to carry our burdens. We do not crumble under the weight of our circumstances, because we are yoked as one with You. The closer we live in this union with You, the more peacefully life transpires for us, regardless of our circumstances. You set us free from caring about whatever is bothering us.

Because of Your plan and purpose for our life, we die to this concern and it no longer has power over our life. If we experience a similar trial, You remind us that we are dead to this issue. It is no longer a false god or a graven image, which consumes our time and attention. We experience total freedom in this area. Now, Satan has less and less to tempt or badger us with in the future. 

Thought for the Day:

When we follow God’s Spirit each moment of the day, we live in overwhelming peace and gratitude for all He has done, is doing and will continue to do for us, in us and through us. 

- Colossians 3:15

Emotional Disconnect during Holiday Celebrations

The first Mother's Day I celebrated after my husband decided that there was no option for us but divorce was the hardest day of my life. I felt a deep loss because I was separated from my children by hundreds of miles.

I went to fellowship with my church as usual, but did not celebrate, because I was too full of grief. I ended up leaving the service early, going to my tiny duplex and eating my homemade ravioli and marinara sauce to assuage my emotional pain.

Mother's and Father's Day, as we celebrate them every year, leave out those men and women who were not able to have children. They grieve this loss every day of their life, but especially on Mother's and Father's Day.

What about men and women who lost a child during pregnancy or maybe even at birth; or those people who chose abortion or adoption in a moment of crisis and are now full of grief, remorse and guilt?

There are people who came to Christ after a period of suffering through jail time, addiction, mental illness or estrangement from their mate; and now it is too late for them to bear children.

Other individuals lost their beloved mother or father through death, and many lost them way too early in life. Some have a parent drifting away from them through Alzheimer's, dementia, cancer or some other debilitating disease.

They are forced to put on happy faces during the hardest day of the year for them. Their grief is invisible to the rest of us, but it is eating them alive as the rest of us celebrate our children and our role as mother and father.

Then there is that percentage of people who suffered cruel treatment at the hand of a parent who was debilitated by health and psychological issues. Insecurity and the loss of their basic human needs, which were never met, affect every moment of their life.

These beloved persons suffered mental, emotional and physical abuse, deprivation, humiliation, degradation and belittlement as children and are still crippled today with physical, emotional and mental handicaps.

Many of us come to Christ and receive His healing, hiding our self with Christ in God (Colossians 3:1-4). Some of us teach our self how to parent our self with nurturing, cherishing and constant care; and to come to God for His nurturing care (1 Peter 5:7).

Some of them suffer alone, because we no longer allow our self to get to know one another in churches. We smile at each other when we enter and leave the one hour service on Sunday morning, but we do not know one another's heartaches and trials.

Prayer:

Father God, help us to get to know one another in the church; so that we can support each other, especially those men and women who suffer silently with deep wounds that may still be raw and infected, or that created a gaping chasm in their life.

Remind us that as a church, we can make holidays less of a challenge and more of a blessing by celebrating all people, not just with those who actually bore children and have healthy and nurturing parents, but also by sharing in the loss and grief of every person in our congregation all through the year.

Thought for the Day:

Our church can have ministries that do more than celebrate or help spouses and parents, but that also minister to all men and women regardless of their marital or parental status. We can learn each other's stories of loss, grief and suffering; and support one another each day of the year.