Click and Read>Matthew 14:22-33
Key Verse:
But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, "Lord, save me!" - Matthew 14:30 (NIV)
I made a startling discovery this week.
There are some awesome people out there doing some amazing things for the Lord, and I DON'T MEASURE UP!
When the kids are tucked in for the night, I love to put my feet up, grab my laptop, and surf my favorite blogs. There are some that I follow on a regular basis and look forward to seeing what has been going on in the lives of my blogging buddies. This week, it became clear to me that my blogging buddies are stellar people. I came across stories of people feeding the hungry, traveling to Africa to serve orphans and other ministries, families adopting here and abroad, people reaching out and ministering to hurting people. Others who are missionaries far from home.
A great wave of discouragement rolled over me. Inventory of my life showed much lacking: Inconsistent prayer life, no time in the Word, nothing done to meet the spiritual or physical needs of hurting people. In my own estimation, I've been boring, blah, and of little value to the Kingdom of God.
As I pushed my stroller along the greenbelt on Thursday afternoon, I prayed about the situation. And I got a strange answer.
The Holy Spirit said to my heart, "Turn your eyes off of yourself and on to the glory of Jesus."
I remembered Peter walking on the water to meet Jesus. As long as his eyes were locked on the Lord, he was doing the miraculous, but as soon as he took his eyes off the Lord, looked at the waves and thought about his own inability to do what he was doing, he sank.
When my eyes and focus are locked on Jesus, I will reflect His glory to this hurting world. When I'm stuck focusing on myself and my sin and failures, I get nowhere other than discouraged. My eyes this week have been on the wrong person.
Awhile ago, I read about a mom who was seriously struggling to love her adopted teenage daughter. She confided in a missionary friend how difficult this girl was to love. The missionary told her, "Quit working so hard to love her. Instead focus on loving God. That is where you will find the ability to love her."
God's purpose in my life is to make me more and more like Jesus. Focusing on my sin and failures won't make me more like Jesus. Focusing on Jesus will make me more like Jesus.
Personal Application:
Read this excerpt from Andrew Murray's book Humility:
Being occupied with self, even having the deepest self-abhorrence can never free us from self. Not to be fully occupied with your sin but to be fully occupied with God brings deliverance from self. This gives us the answer to the question so often asked and seldom clearly understood: How can I die to self? Death to self is not your work: it is God's work.
Commit today to turn your eyes off of yourself and on to the Lord Jesus, desiring to know Him more, so you can reflect Him more. That is when you will make a significant impact on this hurting world.
Father,
Forgive me for my self-focus. Turn my eyes off of me and my failures and on to Jesus and His glory. Make me more like Him. Help me to know Him more and more daily, so I can be transformed into His likeness. Be glorified through me.
In Jesus' Name I pray,
Amen
More of God's Word:
1. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. - Hebrews 12:2 (NIV)
2. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
- 2 Corinthians 3:12-18 (NIV)
Turning my eyes to Jesus,
