I was half listening to a Focus on the Family broadcast on our local Christian station this morning, when I heard a question that made me stop in my tracks. It went something like "How have I become more Christ-like today?". Some days (or weeks) I get so caught up in "the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in" (Mark 4:19) that I only pay lip-service (or blog-service?) to God. How have I become more Christ-like today? Perhaps the answer to that is another question: How have I helped my spouse / child / parent / friend / co-worker to become more Christ-like today? What have I poured into their lives? How have I served them in a Christ-like way?
I know I have been distracted by other things this week, and need to turn my attention back to "Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2).
Where is your focus right now? What is the centre of your world today, the thing that is pushing all else aside, including your relationship with God? Shift your attention, and I promise that "thing" will shrink significantly. How big is your God?
Amazing grace and eternal peace to you,
Bruce
Dear Jesus, help me to spread your fragrance everywhere I go.
Flood my soul with your spirit and life: penetrate and possess my whole being so completely that all my life may be only a radiance of yours.
Shine through me and be so in me that everyone with whom I come into contact may feel your presence within me.
Let them look up and see no longer me – but only Jesus.
Amen.
John Henry Cardinal Newman
 | Bruce MacPherson macpherson@celtic.ca |
Hey Bruce, thanks for these thoughts. That question "How have I become more Christ-like today?" is the antidote to any tendency to merely maintain the status quo. Thanks bro.
ReplyDeleteDan