How Do I Change? (4)

Greetings.

Heat. Thorns. Cross. One more word.

If you have any awareness at all that you need God, TELL HIM. One of the most illusive things about being involved with God is just actually getting to the point where we actually talk to Him. It’s so weird and seemingly useless to actually talk to someone or something that I can’t see. Yes it is. But I get this. I get on a massive metal tube with seats in it and I lift off of the ground and I fly for about an entire day to the other side of the world in Korea….and I will never once see or talk face to face with the pilot. I don’t think a thing about it. God actually invites me to talk to Him about how hard and mysterious all of this is.

“I don’t know how you will ever change me…”. It takes so much courage to talk to God about how we don’t really understand much about how He does what He does. The alternative is continuing in the direction we’ve been going. And when we are able to be gut level honest about how that is actually going for us….(really gut level honest which is actually an indication of God’s movement in us)….it’s pretty empty.

Last Word. Fruit.

Because Jesus did the dying for you to be able to change, we get to repent…say out loud… “I can’t do this by myself. I’m wrong to live life on my own. I have sinned against you Jesus and I want you to turn me around.” And as this happens we can respond to the same old pressures in a brand new way. Jesus lives in us. That is a change. That is different than living for myself which may be one of the world’s greatest hidden pandemics. Step by step, Jesus invites us to look at life through His eyes because He lives in you. That is a change. All of these new things happening is fruit. We don’t conjure it up. We don’t make it happen. It happens because God is at work in us. And perhaps that is one of the greatest changes that we become aware of. God is at work in me totally 100 percent because He chooses to and wants to. He is not under pressure to change me. He changes me because He wants to. And HE DOES IT with me. I’m not coming up with all of this on my own. He lives in me and fruit is His delight for me.

It is not always easy. The changing that happens was first costly for Him and now costly for us. Letting go of my “unchanging” can be really painful. But we’re not enduring that alone. We are actually invited into it exactly the way He was. We get to be like our big brother. Sounds hard and maybe really undesirable at times. It also sounds like one of the deepest, richest most intimate things that you will ever experience.

God, bring the fruit of repentance to us. You’re our only hope. God actually says that us bearing fruit enhances His very glory. That is really hopeful.

Heat. Thorns. Cross. Fruit.

What a story. It’s the story of how God changes us. He does it. The pressure is off. He does it. It’s a miracle.

It’s for you.

There’s more