NOT READY FOR CHANGE
As a Christian, there is a spiritual battle. It is a battle between the spirit and the flesh. Our text tells us that the things I want to do, I don’t do but the things I don’t want to do, that I do. Oh wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? We all know that there is a spiritual battle, but we tend to look in the wrong place for relief and for victory. In other words, we are ok not fighting. We are ok letting things be like they are with no change. That change is tough because it comes with discomfort. Discomfort is a part of change. You can’t have one without the other. Many of us want to change and be this champion for the Lord. Many of us want to walk strong in the lord an the power of His might. What we don’t want to do is the change that is required to get there. So, are we avoiding the change or are we avoiding the discomfort? Change comes with discomfort and we do not like the discomfort so we avoid. We tend to stay where we are which is a place of no conflict. In order for us to change we have to address, overcome and keep the discomfort knowing that the discomfort means that there is change and that changing for the Lord is best. Last week we learned that we must run this Christian race with discipline. We noted that whom the Lord loves, he chastens or disciplines them. Discipline is not pleasant at the time but it necessary for growth and change. We can’t be ok where we are. The ironic thing is in order to change we need the discomfort. Also, in order for there to be a change, we have to realize the condition that we are in. That is whey there needs to be a change
Let's just be honest, we need to admit to Jesus that we are a mess. We not even close to being what we need to be or suppose to be. Let’s stop fooling ourselves, we are a mess. Comparing ourselves with others whose behaviors are worse than ours don’t makes us less than a mess. We need to call it our loud that we are a Mess! Because we are a mess, we are always looking for substitutes to fill that void of emptiness. We know that we are empty because we can’t find the joy of the Lord. Little things get under our skin so quickly. We find a place to hide to indulge in those things that keeps the discomfort of change away. You know, porn, women, men, working long hours, drugs, alcohol, hating things, politics. So we start to do things that make us ‘responsible’ and believe that this will make us ok. We pay our bills, we get the work on time, we are honest with others but, if we are honest with ourselves, we are still stressed. We come home bored with no meaning or no purpose. We are tired and not knowing where to turn. We forget that we need God and we forget to tell Him that I need You.
We are dealing with us not being at our best. We try to medicate the pain to end it. But not knowing we are love, not knowing if we fit in, not knowing our purpose can cause the pain to keep knocking at your door. Then we try to hush those voices in our brain that tell us we aren’t good enough, we aren’t lovable, we are guilty and full of shame. Those voices we tend to keep and not share with others that seem to keep the need to change and the discomfort at bay. But if I tell the truth I'm so afraid of truth, but we know it and God know it. We know we need to pray, but we don't know how to say that I'm not ready to change. We stop praying because when we pray, we are face to face with the truth. If we are faced with the truth, we have to change. Our prayers and without faith, full of repetition and not focused on the change that is needed to be more productive in our life for God. we know how to say the right thing, but we are basing with we say on what we have heard and not what we have experienced with God. We wanna trust in God, but if I tell the truth we are not ready, to change.
There are facts about us that we don’t want to face because we depend on our feelings to tell us what is what. The fact is we are depressed. The fact is we don’t pray. The fact is we don’t study. The fact is that we aren’t strong. The fact is we depend on us and not God. The fact is that things really bother us. The fact is we don’t have a lot of positives about us. The image of who we are seems to be lost in the feelings we feel. Things start happening to us that we can’t figure out and we start looking for feeling to cause a change. Because we are in a struggle we can’t seem to find the faith to depend on God. When a trial comes, we look to feeling better about it rather than seek the factual truth about what God says. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. We make decision
But when we slow down and face the facts, my feeling's not a fact we find ourselves in the same defeated place with no way out. We need God but are afraid to go to Prayer to seek His face in a real and meaningful way. We are ok with talking to God, but are afraid of having a conversation with Him. We know that we need to pray but we don’t know what to say. We get up and turn from God, painting Him as too hard, that He doesn’t hear us and that we can’t get this thing right. Our pride makes it hard to surrender to change so we pretend that have it together. Even though our world is falling apart we still avoid change.
We are more. We need to seek His face. Seek His comfort. Accept His love. Accept His Grace and Mercy. Accept that He is always there for us. Accept that he is there through the hurt, thru the pain. He wants and Loves us. He has positives about us. We are his Children and the sheep of His pasture. He has not condemned us but we have. We know we’re not a finished product but don’t always realize that we just need to get up. We need to remember who we are and how we are made. We have been through a lot and have learned a lot. What we have gone through is an opportunity to change. We don’t look like what we have been through but we have been through and are stronger because of it. Let God grow us through change. We need to pray and I want you to know what you need to say. Are you ready for change? It’s time to walk by faith and leave your feelings to a different place. Let these change you:
For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:
There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
For we walk by faith and not by sight. I will never leave you nor forsake you
Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
