I love cappuccino coffee. When I go out, I love to try a different café and taste the coffee. I have found there is good coffee, bad coffee and wonderfully delicious coffee. Sometimes I go to the same café on different days and I find delicious coffee on one day and ordinary coffee on a different day.
I talked about it to a café proprietor I know, and she explained it this way. It depends on who serves you. If a person who does not love coffee serves you, the coffee is not likely to be good.
What is the message here? If you want to bring people to God, you must learn to love the taste of the Holy Spirit. You cannot be a good cook if you don’t enjoy your own food.
Christian service can become an end in itself. You can work hard at being a good Christian but in fact you are trying to conform to human ideas of being a good Christian.
So often we can copy church leaders or copy one another, or be ruled by rigid ideas of Christian duty and morality.
In the New Testament, Jesus taught something quite different. He called his disciples to follow him personally, to be with him, to know him, to enjoy his company.
I find that I can also fall into this trap. I get consumed with doing good things for God, but I spend less time enjoying His company. I get spiritually and emotionally dry.
Jesus said:
My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.
And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. Jn 10:27–28 NKJV
I can read my bible and feel the touch of God in my heart or I can just read the Bible. I can pray and tell God what I think or need, or I can tell God what I think he wants to hear, or I can ask God what He wants to tell me and expect Him to answer.
This poor man cried out, and the LORD heard him, And saved him out of all his troubles.
The angel of the LORD encamps all around those who fear Him, And delivers them.
Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; Blessed is the man who trusts in Him! Ps 34:6–8 NKJV
Taste and see ….
No comments:
Post a Comment