A week of growing in sacrifice

Philippians 4:8,” Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things.”

I used to have a poster with this verse on it. It was green and pink and completely 90’s chic. And with all do honesty, I still did not give this verse much thought. It always seemed just too much to apply at once and if I couldn’t do it what’s the point of upsetting myself by looking at it? Well today I can honestly say that I looked at this verse. And it was honestly such a blessing.

You see, recently I have been struggling when it comes to focusing. I am the real life Walter Mitty. My brain is just going a thousand miles per hour. It starts to go to never land and it takes all of my willpower to bring it back to reality. You see I know that my God is not the God of confusion but of order. So if my brain is in complete and utter chaos it is not from the Lord. So I need to combat this. Now why am I telling you this? Well because this verse towards the end says something that is very important, “meditate on these things.”

It does no good for me to clear my mind of ungodly chaos if something does not replace it. Because unless something takes the chaos’ place then it will just come right back. So here Paul is telling the church in Philippi that they need to fill their minds by meditating on these things. Well what things? Well that would be the rest of the verse. I need to constantly be focusing on what is true, just, pure, lovely, of a good report, things of virtue and things that are praiseworthy. These things are the things that I need to be focusing on. And do you know what the funny thing is? Is that all these things start with God. God is true, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous and praiseworthy. So ultimately if my focus is on Him then my mind will begin to focus on these things and my mind will be in order.

Philippians 3:9, “and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith,”

Be found in Him, what a marvelous place to be found. And whenever I think of this, I think of the verse in Proverbs 18:10 which says, “The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are safe.” I run for safety in His name. Whenever I am being attacked, whether it be the devil accusing me, my own flesh fighting against the Spirit or the world trying to draw me in, I need to be found in Christ. He is the one that will protect me. I am able to stand not by my own name but in Christ.

The only other option for “safety” is myself. I could choose to stand in my own works and my own righteousness but that will not last very long. Because as soon as the devil starts accusing me, how can I stand? What he is saying is most likely true. I am a liar, I am a thief, I am a sinner. Even if I do a million bazillion things right I cannot wipe out even one thing that I have done that was wrong. I just can’t, so standing in my own righteousness falls with the first blow.

So I have decided to stand in God’s righteousness and the only way that I can do this is by faith. Like Ephesians 2:8-10 says, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” When we are saved we have taken on the righteousness of Christ. And let us walk in that and take refuge in the fact that it is Christ that lives and it is not I. And he will complete the work that He has started in me.

Philippians 3:10, “my goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to His death.”

Goal. Whenever I think of this, I automatically think of soccer. I know this kind of seems obvious that my mind would wander to soccer but that is ok. In soccer the one thing that you want is the goal. You will do anything to get that goal. You will kick harder, you will move faster, and you will try to out think your opponent to get the goal.

So with this analogy, the goal is sought after. And if you take it back to this verse my goal I to know God, the power of his resurrection, and to partake in His sufferings. Now the first two seems great to know God the power of his resurrection, GREAT! The third one is the one that I struggle with. I do not want to suffer. I want life to go well, I am kind of over the whole suffering bit. And this quite frankly is a terrible attitude to have.

When you get married, the vows say for better or for worst, in sickness and in health, for richer or for poorer. And just like many people today are not listening to these vows and taking them seriously. We being the bride of Christ, do we take them seriously? No matter what happens are we going to stay? Are we going to draw closer to Him or push Him away? I hope the answer would be that we would stay. Because we know that no matter what happens all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose.

I need to be at a place where I can saw that my goal is to know God, the power of his resurrection and fellowship in his suffering.

“If, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” Philippians 3:11

Any means…. Am I willing to give up anything, and do anything that I may partake in what Jesus did on the cross and His resurrection?

This week is about sacrifice and many of my classmates have come to the conclusion that our sacrifice isn’t really sacrifice in light of the sacrifice of the cross. But I haven’t, until this moment come to that conclusion. Everything inside of me wants to say that the “sacrifices” that I have given have been a huge deal and that anyone would be amazed at what I have given. But if I were to be honest with myself, I would have to say that my “sacrifices” haven’t been that big of a deal.

Let me put it another way, why do Christians not sacrifice animals anymore? Well because Jesus is the ultimate sacrifice and nothing we could do could measure up to that sacrifice. In fact, nothing we could do could add to it or take away from it either. And all HE is asking for is an obedient bondservant, and even that He helps me with by giving me the Holy Spirit.

Am I willing to lay it all down to follow Him? I want to answer this honestly and say at this point I can’t. But God. He has been helping me realize what I need to lay down, when I need to lay it down and how I need to do it. And on top of that He is the one who gives me the strength to do it. He is helping me be willing to be willing. I am His workmanship and He is not done with me yet! I can already see the work He has done in my own life in this area. The more I have walked with my God the more willing I have become.

Philippians 3:12-13, “Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead.”

So today was one of the harder days of being in Guatemala and it was because I had to stay in my room ALL day! I had been sick from yesterday afternoon until today at 5:00. And I am still not at 100% normalcy. I must admit that I cried several times because I had to stay in my room but it turned into a time where God began to minister to me. And lo and behold it has to do with today’s Inductive Bible Study.

You see, I was having one major pity party in my room and as I just finished the book of Hosea. I decided to complete my homework by reading the first three chapters of Calvary Road. And in the first chapter it starts to list some sins and one of them was: self-pity. Yikes! I had just been rebuked. What a reminder that I am not yet perfected. But what was I to do now that I know that I am still a sinner? Throw myself another pity party? No! Like Mrs. Brooke was telling me earlier, there is a difference between pressing on and pushing through. Pushing through is in your own power and pressing on is the Holy Spirit’s power.

I need to press on in the Holy Spirit’s power. I know that I am a messed up sinner but God did not die on the cross for me to throw a pity party for myself and to not press on. He rose again to give me life and that more abundantly. So I repent and move on to the things that God has in store for me.