the funny thing is that before God can even tell us where to go or what to do we tag on to our promises an 'after i...' or 'let me do this first'.
Lord, i'm going to follow you, but after this one last pull.
Lord imma get it right, but after i spend one last night.
Lord, i got you - imma follow you, but lemme take one last drink.
luke 9:58-62 tells of how people were lining up to follow Jesus when one man said, 'let me go bury my father and then imma be able to follow you.'
to this Jesus replied : let the dead bury their own dead, but you go ahead and proclaim the kingdom of God.
we do this all the time. often times when we choose life & decide to follow Jesus we realize that some of our relationships are dead or rather, that some people in our lives have not chosen to be resurrected and are therefore dead (in the Spirit at least). when God tells us that it's time to move on we either try to bring our dead friends along or we try to stay there with them.
we txt/email/call/gchat... claiming that we're taking care of them in the same way that the follower claimed he was burying his father. really when we prolong our walk with God for the sake of a dead situation we begin to bury ourselves with them.
another man said to Jesus, 'hey look, i'm coming but lemme jus go say bye to my people first.' (v.61)
Jesus answered him 'no one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.'
ouch. this sounds harsh...
what Jesus is saying is that we can't move forward if we're constantly looking back. if we look back we won't know where we're going and we'll be more focused on who we're leaving behind rather than the one we're supposed to be following.
in genesis 19 when God destroyed sodom&gomorrah, He instructed lot and his family to not look back. lot's wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt.
lemme make this personal::
i was in a relationship that was both ungodly & unhealthy, but everytime i would make moves to get out of it, i would dwell on the relationship with my ex rather than dwell on my new relationship with God. because i was looking back, i was unable to stay on the right path. all it would take was one txt message for me to fall back into the trap.
i continued in this cycle for almost a year... i didn't get it right the first time, but God eventually showed me that i had to keep my eyes on Him. i had to focus on Him and not on what i was missing out or on who i was missing. i had to realize that nobody could ever hold a candle to the greatness of God therefore nobody was worth looking back for.
let go of the dead people. stop trying to carry them with you & stop trying to stay behind with them - they may be great people, but they aren't worth the life you can have with God if you stay focused on Him.
it hurts to let people go but Jesus said in Matthew 5:29 that if your right eye causes you to sin, pluck out your eye. im not encouraging you to dismember your body, but if there is someone in your life causing to get stuck on repeat, you gotta chuck em the deuces, guard up your heart in prayer and keep it moving.
its difficult, but its so doable.
you gotta be like the horses in a horse race. a race horse wears blinders around its eyes so that it cannot see to the right or to the left of it. all that it can see is the target in front of it. place spiritual blinders around your eyes so that all you can see is God before you. don't you look to the left or to the right and definitely don't look back! trust in the way that God is leading you.
don't worry about saying goodbye to folks or about trying to explain to them where yourr going. you really don't need one last high - God is the most high. you don't need one last drink - Jesus is the living water that will forever quench your thirst. you don't need one last kiss - if you resist this one temptation, satan won't even come at you in this way again.
stop checking his facebook page - he's gonna be fine.
and there is no need to send her a txt, she'll only try to reminisce.
don't worry, God will resurrect them - He's big enough to handle both you and them.
realize that God is greater than anything in your
~Dove Sister Ariel Pierson~
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