This is not the usual post, but I felt it would be a blessing to someone if I shared. Just some thoughts from my morning devotion.
My Musings
Rom. 8: 32 “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him
up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?”
While in my morning
musings I consider the passage of scripture above and began to wonder at the
depth of its richness. To truly understand the depth of the love with which God
has loved us; in that HE gave Christ, whom He loves supremely, that we might
have opened to us the great way of salvation; and that it should be given to us
that all other things have been made available to us as well.
In this same vein,
consider these words from George McDonald, “Man finds it hard to get what he
wants because he does not want what is best. God finds it hard to give because
he would give the best, and man will not take it. What Jesus did was what the
Father is always doing. The suffering he endured was that of the Father from
the foundation of the world, reaching its climax in the person of His son.”
But for my thoughts, let
me consider mainly, the words which state, “Man finds it hard to get what he
wants because he does not want what is best. God finds it hard to give because
he would give the best, and man will not take it.”
As I considered my own
state of being I could see this parallel so clearly: it is the human condition.
Take for instance the question of health and fitness. I take note of my own condition and I see,
that my cholesterol is high, my weight is up and my cardio vascular health is
waning. Yet even while I take pain medication for aches in my head, shoulder
and back, I have consumed a high fat, high carb meal, and have set sedentary
for most of the day.
Even as I lament my
declining health, I have not only done nothing to alleviate the problem, but
have instead actively added to it. I see
this not as special, but normal, regular, almost expected in the course and
culture in which I live. While in my
deepest of hearts I truly long to be lean healthy and strong, but in the
weakness of my flesh I do nothing more than wish. I do not plan. I do not act.
I do not change.
The same is true of my
spiritual walk. In my heart of hearts I truly want to walk in the fullness of
light and life as provided by God’s grace. And even as I pray and ask God to
change me, to make me over in the image and likeness of His son, Jesus, I find
that I do nothing to make those changes mine: to realize them in my life.
Like with my physical
fitness, I make excuse after excuse for my not making the necessary changes to
see my goal realized, I also do not the needed things to see my spiritual man
come alive in life and power.
In this I am reminded of
what the Apostle Paul said in Rom. 8:32:
“He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall
He not with Him also freely give us all things?” If God has given me Jesus and
with HIM everything else needful of my walk in grace, then the problem, the
hindrance must be in me. Not just in
that I am weak in the flesh and deluded by sin, but rather that I have purposefully
chosen – just as surely as I have chosen to not do anything about my physical
state of being – to do nothing about my spiritual state of being, and in doing
so have chosen to not truly believe God; to not take Him at His word.
In this is the truth as
written by George McDonald realized in me, “Man(Ray) finds it hard to get what
he wants because he does not want what is best. God finds it hard to give
because he would give the best, and man(Ray) will not take it.”
So now I have declared my
musing and see them all the clearer for having written them down. However the
question remains, not that I have understood them, not even in my knowing them
to be true, but rather am I willing to first believe God at His word, and
secondly then to do what I know to be right. In essence do I want what is best?
