So today while eating dinner I thought about the Princess Bride movie that I have seen a gazillion times (at least) can quote from it rather profusely and remembered the scene with Billy Crystal (Miracle Max) when he was trying to put air back into his lungs... he said "there is a difference between being mostly dead and all the way dead"... "your friend is just mostly dead"...
This got me thinking about my spiritual life in connection with how dead I am to sin and self. Am I only mostly dead in some areas - pruning is a painful process - but necessary for life - true life and fruitfulness. What more are You pruning in me Lord? I know I need it - but ouch! This is a part of trusting You fully - allowing You to have Your way in me - really. And also dying to self is a picture of absolute surrender. Yup, i definitely need to surrender more to You and what You want and how You want to work in and through me. How You want to heal me, use me, fill me, restore me, free me, live through me... am I still the clay? Wow - so often I have tried to be the potter - what I mess I make when I forget who You are and who I am.
I've been on a Daniel fast - okay - a pseudo Daniel fast - have fasted certain foods but not a strict Daniel fast. Today, the Lord said - I want you to fast something else. Fasting is part of dying to yourself and food doesn't have a hold on you - but this something else that I want you to fast does. So... I'm fasting this something else. So that more of His life can come through me and I can trust Him with giving to me what He wants from His life - from Himself - from His will and heart for me - into this part of me. To depend on Him really depend on Him.
We live in a world that tells us and shows us how to please ourselves, gratify ourselves, live for ourselves... how to basically keep self on the throne - how to worship ourselves. We really are living in a society that says we can be our own 'god' - we don't have to answer to anyone - we can recreate god into our own likeness. Yikes! So opposite of what God want to do in us - conform us into Christ likeness.
Yes, the desires that God gives us are good and are for our good, others' good and ultimately for His glory - and there is a time when His desires that He gives us are to be fulfilled and there is also a beauty in being content and filled with Him as He is working these desires out into reality. Letting Him conform our will to His. Letting self - the old nature really die so Christ can be seen in us. Letting the old nature - the old man stay dead... and live from the new life we have in Him. Choose to live from this life - His life - His Spirit in us. Trusting Him to purify our hearts - trusting Him with the deep desires of our hearts. Letting Him restore the real us - the real me and the real you - with Christ's life in us and the fullness of His eternal life pervading every area of our 'true selves'.
'I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless, I live. Yet not I, but Christ lives in me. And the life I now live - I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me." Galatians 2:20
To the disciple Jesus says... "If anyone wishes to come after Me, He must deny himself, take up His cross, and follow Me." Matthew 16:24
"To deny self is a daily matter that should never cease. Paul said, 'I die daily' "(I Corinthians 15:31)
"For the Christian, death to self is the door to life. It is the only way to fruitfulness. Hence death is absolutely necessary. But how many of us are really dead? Death to self is the cessation of all self's activity. If you haven't experienced death to self, your spiritual life will have little progress." Watchman Nee
"Die to gain life? Such a paradox but a necessary truth." Michelle Lenz
Father,
Thank you for reminding me to live my life as a continual living sacrifice - which is my worship to You.
