Truth or Dare

When I talk to God, I'm usually just playing this useless game of truth or dare. Truth: what is your will for me? What am I doing wrong here? Am I being honest? Dare: Use me. Guide Me. Lead Me. Sounds a little selfish if you ask me and I feel like when His Son has already been sacrificed to give the world, I could be asking a little more often what I can do on His behalf.

It made perfect sense at the Bible study I helped lead this past Thursday night. Ephesians 2 is talking directly to us about casting off our old sin, which we were enslaved to in our old lives, and becoming alive in Christ with the strength he has bestowed upon us through the Holy Spirit.

"And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. " (Ephesians 2: 6, 7)

So just throught his kindness, he decidede to give us eternal life, which I find wildly surprising. He is consistently true to character. How awesome to live righteously with no option of sinning or failure. Christ did it.

But for how indebted we are to Him, he still asks nothing of us to obtain salvation. It's "priceless" for a reason but it seems that we should be actively working on his behalf as well. Yet again, God sees our prideful nature as humans and stops our pride in its tracks as we think that what we do for Him could make any difference in our salvation:

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast."

And then we rationalize our sin. Well, if God is gonna forgive either way, and I can't do anything to earn His grace, why not sin? He cleverly answers that question too. He's just too smart for our human little peabrains. freely giving us salvation is NOT synonymous with giving us license to sin. We are still called to do great things for Him. He even sweetly calls us His "workmanship", or artwork. The God of the Heavens, calling us His art...wow. We should be using that gift! As a work of art living with the Holy Spirit, He can use us for His good purposes.

"For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."

Life application: How can I actively be God's workmanship without attempting to earn my salvation? I'm not a theological scholar, but I think the answer here is to be sincere and do things out of pure Love and Gratitude for Christ's sacrifice. It's not about Who am I supposed to be? or How many church functions can I attend?..It's about Am I living out my life with respect to the ultimate Love that Christ showed me? Am I glorifying Him and striving to be holy in all that I say and do?

I think that's what God wants from us. Sincerity. Honor. Respect. LOVE. Doing things with the right motives is a hard feat. But I'm trying, and that's all I can do.

Yours,

Diane Elise

Broken...again

So thankful to have my eyes open to the tragedy of my weaknesses. I understand that I'm human, and I understand we can't be perfect. But why is it that everytime I feel like I'm making progress I fall hard? I'm really tired of knowing what I should be doing and then doing the complete opposite. Yes, it comes with the territory as a human because we're fallen. I'm just so frustrated!!...confused, shocked, scared. I don't think that anyone could truly look at my life and notice a Christian. And that makes me unbelievably sad. I don't want to live sinfully and yet I succumb to sin time and time again. I can't wait to be in God's kingdom and live every second to purely glorify Him. I haven't been able to say that I've glorified God in anything I've done lately. But it's more than treading water. It's like I'm actually swimming with the current of the world I'm supposed to be fighting against. I'm thankful to be broken and see that I need God so desperately. I'm thankful for the trillion blessings He's given me. I'm mostly thankful my salvation doesn't rely on my own rap sheet because I'm 100% certain I'd have a one-way ticket south if it did. I miss God. I miss doing what I'm supposed to do. And I'm ready to be the person I'm supposed to be. I can't do it myself though. Left to my own devices, I would continuously be running on a linoleum floor with car wax on it.

God, give me strength to be yours and only yours. Don't let me split my heart between you and the world.

Yours,

Diane Elise