11% succeed. That means only 1 out of every 3 who seem like they're trying actually appear to have reached their goal to the casual observer.
Today's a little different than a normal week. This is an active participation devotional. You don't have to share your answers to these questions with anyone; this is meant to be an opportunity for you to be openly honest with yourself. No judgmental eyes are watching you. No one's going to force you to explain your answer to them. This is just you and Jesus.
Now. Where would you classify yourself, under those numbers at the top? (you are not allowed to scroll down until you've answered this :)
I won't post my answer here, but I'll tell you this: I'm not part of that 11% yet.
Why not? Why can't we all honestly say that we've not only "surrendered our lives to Jesus", but are actually living out that promise in every aspect of our lives? How does that even work?
A couple weeks ago, God drew my attention to a new aspect of the Grape metaphor. I think John 15 gives a lot of direction on this question.
John 15
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes[a] so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
I don't know if you've ever witnessed the natural phenomenon of a grape growing by itself on the ground.... I know I haven't! If grapes are going to grow, they need the vine. It's impossible for us to follow God's calling to be grapes in the world if we don't remain on the vine. The church can't be Jesus to the world if it doesn't stay attached to Him.
I love the way Eric Ludy put it one of his sermons..... a lamp can't shine unless it's plugged in. If it's not attached to its outlet, then it just stands in the way, as a pointless piece of decorum, and people trip over it.
Grapes aren't designed to be decorations. You don't see people walking around a vineyard, complimenting the grapes on how beautiful and ripe they look. Grapes are made to be crushed. They are designed to be poured-out.
Second question: What is it in your life that's cutting you off from the vine?
And here's the toughest one of all: Are you willing to remove that from your life? Even if God wants it to be completely gone (and not just lessened)?
I've been reading Leslie Ludy's book Set-Apart Femininity, and in it, she referenced a study guide that was on her blog. This guide was called: "Cleaning the Sanctuary". The goal was to identify and remove all the garbage that was cluttering your heart, and preventing Jesus from entering those areas. It included almost 15 entire pages of tough, direct questions about how you were handling your life. It was a pretty excruciating process to complete. Jesus called to mind all kinds of things that I'd done in the past, and not only did He call me to remove those actions from my life, but He also probed me to confess to my mom that I'd done them. Cleaning the Sanctuary, and all that it involved, was no cakewalk...to say the least!
But now that it's over, I can't even believe how much closer I feel to Jesus! Everything that I'd been hiding now lay completely exposed at His feet, and now, He has the space to turn that into something beautiful.
Chances are, if you didn't classify yourself as part of that 11%, there's something cutting you off from the Vine. And without the vine, us as grapes die fast. The things keeping you from the vine may not be inherently wrong, like some of mine were; in fact, they might actually be good things taken too far. But, whatever they are, I promise you: if you choose to lay them down at the foot of the cross, and completely let go... He will make something beautiful out of it.
2 comments:
It's true! Funny how we (and I'm certainly guilty of this) say we want to surrender our lives totally to Christ, and yet we can be so very reluctant to actually take concrete steps towards getting rid of those things that keep us from getting closer to Him.
I also liked what you said about things not being inherently bad keeping you from Christ. That is SO true. There are a lot of things in this world that aren't bad in and of themselves, and may even be good in moderation, but if you have too little or too much, they become obstacles. And the problem is, we rarely have that balance and moderation.
A friend of mine pointed out something really interesting. We all know Christ is perfect, in every aspect of His life. Now this includes balance. She noted that "He knew when to stick around the crowd and when to withdraw by Himself." I had never really thought about it that way before.
I think an important part of living the Christian life is finding that balance. In some areas, certain people are on the "too little" side and some are on the "too much." That may be completely reversed in other areas. It takes a lot of living with yourself to learn where you fall in each area and how to bring yourself towards balance in each area. :)
My dad says that the Christian life is a lot like playing whack-a-mole. You feel convicted of a fault or area of your life where you're not as close to Christ as you should be. So you pray about it and work at it and finally, it seems as if you're conquering that fault! Then, about as soon as you think you've gotten taken care of, you feel convicted in another area. When that area's taken care of, the original one springs back up again! It's all about perseverance, and continuing to pick life that hammer to whack down those faults.
That's so true, Ellen!! I love the part about the balance..... I think that's a big thing with NCFCA, for me. I know it's a fantastic opportunity for all kinds of things, but at the same time, I've definitely seen myself taking it too far. When you fall asleep every night thinking about what events you want to do next season, or about a person or people in the region (like I did 2 years ago), that's taking it a little far.
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