There is no place like home.
Bring us home, God.
"Now all the tax collectors and the sinners were coming near Him to listen to Him." If we didn't think we needed God, would we come? The tax collectors were not honest men. They came out of conviction. Luke 15:1
And does conviction draw us into God's heart? If we feel distant from God, then we are. Are we missing opportunities? Missing our thoughts? And He said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of men, but God knows your hearts; for that which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God." Luke 16:15.
"The great folly of sinners, and that which ruins them, is, being content in their lifetime to receive their good things." Matthew Henry. Are we content with the blessings? The real question is: Have we returned to our God like the Prodigal Son who kept on walking all the way home and didn't stop.
PRAYER FROM PSALMS
When You, O Father, have brought us back, we become like men comforted, like those who dream. Thank you God for calling us and bringing us home. Psalm 126:1
Being a disciple is serious business. And our authentic lavish Grace that we experience has a cost. Jesus was the ransom. Discipleship requires us to never cheapen Grace by shortchanging the process. There is no forgiveness without the Propitiation, and without true repentance. Grace is freely extended, but never without cost.
ReplyDelete“Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession.... Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”
― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost Of Discipleship
Thanks, Annette for the quote from Bonhoeffer. He was so wise and hit the nail on the head over and over and over.
ReplyDeleteAs I read Chapter 15 today, I saw notes in my Bible evidently from Sunday School several years ago when I was still in a ladies class. On verse 15 where it says "and he sent him into the fields to feed the swine," I have written...when we leave the "field" that God has put us in, the enemy puts us in another one. And then I have "the thing in your "field" is there to conform you to Christ likeness". Oh, my how that spoke to me and stepped on my toes all at the same time. The verses that God gave me this summer that I thought were just for my daughter moving away and now has told me they are also for this "season" this "field" I am in with my son's children go along with these statements. James 1:2-8 and Romans 8:28. The refining and purifying and molding of my soul and life is not altogether pleasant but I do KNOW that it is what has been ordained for me and it is so that His light can shine far more brightly from me than it ever has. I do NOT want to be like the older son who is the one who is truly the Prodigal and not the younger son who came running back to the father.
What in life brings contentment to me? Is it the Lord or things in this world which mean nothing and in no way denote I am a Christian? What opportunities have I missed because I spiritually blind or sated with things of the world?
ReplyDeleteLord, I pray I take discipleship seriously and truly follow You and point others to You.
Bring me home.
ReplyDeleteEvery day, Annette, you come home.
Here.