The Special of the Day… From the Orange Moon Cafe…
“Rest… Work”
We must rest after we work in natural terms. Spiritually, however, we rest in order to work.
“For He that is entered into His rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from His” (Hebrews 4:10).
In a life wherein Scripture calls us to “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might,” no possibility exists that we could live according to God’s standards by our own strength (Ephesians 6:10). “Without Me, ye can do nothing” declared the Lord Jesus Christ to His disciples (John 15:5). The most simple task performed in the Lord’s vineyard requires His indwelling and enabling Spirit. This required a proactive commitment to trust God - to rest - which requires a companion determination to not commit the folly of which the Psalmist warned us: “He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool: but whoso walketh wisely, he shall be delivered’ (Proverbs 28:26).
While such truth greatly challenges our flesh, it fills and fulfills our spirits. Indeed, our hearts were made for the enlivening and enabling Holy Spirit to serve as the Life of our lives. We do much with mind, tongue, hands, and feet as He moves within us to reveal the character and nature of Christ by us. “Be ye doers of the Word and not hearers only” (James 1:22). A heart at rest, however, initiates and accompanies our efforts led and empowered by the Holy Spirit. Even as we sweat and pant in our labors of faith, we know deeply within that Someone else serves as the power thereof because we have acknowledged our utter weakness and dependence on Him. Thus, we rest within, even as we work without.
Our flesh will not rest easy in the light of such truth as it “lusteth against the spirit” (Galatians 5:17). Thus, we return often to the altar of grace through faith built within our hearts when we trusted Christ and Christ alone for salvation. “As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus our Lord, so walk ye in Him” (Colossians 2:6). We remove our shoes on such holy ground. Only nail-pierced Feet may stand here. All others kneel and rest in the glorious light of grace that will call us to arise and walk, but only as guided and enabled by “the power that worketh in us” (Ephesians 3:20). Because in the life to which God calls us, we rest in order to work.
“We are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.”
(Philippians 3:3)
Weekly Memory Verse
Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.”(Philippians 1:6).
7878
No comments:
Post a Comment