“Knowing the correct password—saying ‘Master, Master,’ for instance—isn’t going to get you anywhere with me. What is required is serious obedience— doing what my Father wills. I can see it now—at the Final Judgment thousands strutting up to me and saying, ‘Master, we preached the Message, we bashed the demons, our God-sponsored projects had everyone talking.’ And do you know what I am going to say? ‘You missed the boat. All you did was use me to make yourselves important. You don’t impress me one bit. You’re out of here.’ Matthew 7:21-23 MSG
One thing has become increasingly clear to me as I continue to grow in my relationship with Christ: Life is more spiritual than I may think. That’s certain.
We live in an “It doesn’t take all of that. God knows my heart” kind of society. As a result of yielding to this mindset, it has desensitized us to certain things. The thing about being desensitized is that there’s a gradual decline in your awareness that something may be wrong. It doesn't come all at once, that would be too easy to recognize... It's gradual. Things start off strict and you have these guidelines in place… and the next thing you know, you’re not only doing things that you’ve said you wouldn’t do, but you’re saying things you said you wouldn’t have said and you’re just living differently. It may not be because you want to… but something is just different.
I don’t want to get into what our various struggles and sins are… but we all have them. The issue is when we make excuses to keep living in them. The issue is when we make excuses to keep indulging in our flesh and pushing us further and further away from God. The “It doesn’t take all of that. God knows my heart” mindset pretty much supports the thought that we can sin and be in God’s will at the same time. We can, essentially, do whatever we want, as long as we “do right by God”, He’ll be happy.
Reading this scripture earlier this week was real eye opener for me because a lot of us “do right by God.” We go to church, we tithe, we talk nicely, and we give to the poor. At times, we serve in soup kitchens… we do a lot of the right things, but we fail to actually spend time with God. We fail to actually get to know God. We fail to seek Christ and pursue His will for our lives. We live nicely and we claim that it is divinely inspired, but the fact is that these are simply nice actions. You don’t have to have received salvation to be a nice person. I know a lot of people who have not accepted Christ as their savior, yet they feed the hungry. They don’t believe Christ died for their sins, but they serve the needy and clothe the homeless. Not all unsaved people are evil. They don’t walk around lurking in shadows and waiting to pounce on people who claim Christianity. Some of them “look” just like those of us who claim Christ as our savior.
What separates us is beyond what we can see. It’s spiritual. Simply carrying the Holy Spirit sets us apart from the nicest people on the planet. There’s something deeper there. It’s deeper than flesh. It’s deeper than what we can set our eyes to.
God wants our hearts. He doesn’t want just your actions. You can’t just say a few prayers here and there and give a little money here and there to cleanse your sins. You can’t do that just to make you feel better… God wants us to give Him time! We have to spend time in worship. Spend time in prayer. Spend time reading His word and getting to know His heart so that we can give Him ours completely.
It’s funny because I feel like this is all redundant… growing up in church, I hear stuff like this all the time. I just don’t see it lived out very often. To be honest, that’s what hinders us from experiencing the full power of God. We put limits on where He has access in our lives. We put limits on how we show and live our Christianity… the truth is that God wants it all. It’s a bit tough to process at first, but it’s true. Our friends should reflect our relationship with Christ. How we spend our free time should reflect our relationship with God. Even down to what we spend our money on… All of this is a reflection of where your heart is. God wants your heart and your life will show whether he has it.
This is all more than actions, it’s deeper than that. It’s more than saying the right things, it’s deeper than that. It’s a heart thing… when we give God our hearts, He gives us his spirit. The Spirit is what sets us apart! It’s spiritual.