Allowing God to work through us

If I asked you, what does it mean to be a believer in Christ?

what exactly would you say?

If I asked you, how do I become a follower in Christ?

what exactly would you say?

Would you give me a list of commands I must follow?

Would you tell me I have to know the word?

Would you tell me I have to go to this certain church,

pray this certain prayer? read this certain verse?

Or would you say:

"Trust in the Lord God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength,

accept him into your life, and put him first above all.

acknowledge that your a sinner, and you have been forgiven,

that a price was paid for that forgiveness"

What does putting God first mean anyways?

and how should we live our lives?

Last week I wrote about the disciple Stephen in the blog,

and how he was stoned to death for speaking out.

essentially speaking out against the religious who

devise ways to satisfy God then take pride in

meeting the standards they themselves have set.

I admit I've fallen to that plenty of times myself,

if we want to know the true way to live our lives for God...

we need to simply just look at the prophets and disciples.

This past week I believe my faith has grown, and that would be

thanks to obviously God, but also my Mom who God worked through.

You see, God revealed something to her, that yes we already knew...

but somehow we were not following/understanding.

It essentially goes right along with the disciple Stephen,

and what he was trying to tell the Jewish order.

Putting God first means allowing him to work through us,

allowing his will to be done, and I know this all seems really

simple and thats because it is. I think sometimes we, and when I say

we, I mean "We" as christians become to blinded with trying to

"please God" that we don't pay attention to what he is actually

saying. I think sometimes we become to confined in a "religious spirit"

that in the end we are not even pleasing God, we are just pleasing

our own ideas of his word, and our own ideas of who and what God is.

You see we can read Gods word all we want, but if he doesn't

reveal it to us, then all we are going to do is interpret it ourselves,

and thus we have our own opinion of what it means.

This is why there is so many denominations, because half the time

we are not asking God to reveal his word to us,

we are jut trying to read and understand his word ourselves

and we come up with our own opinion of what it means.

We must ask God to reveal his word to us, read what he wants us to read,

and ask for him to tell us what it means.

I think we all strive to have God work through us,

for us to be that empty vessel he can use.

However, if we are to busy going through our routine prayers

or our daily routine of reading his word or just our daily

routine of life in general, I don't see how he can use us to

our full potential. This is where the duh moment came in,

this is where I think my faith grew. Now don't get it twisted either..

I'm not saying don't pray and don't read the bible..

I'm saying put God first. Don't read to please...don't pray to please..

and ask for him to reveal his word to you, and he will.

Think of it like this...

lets say I come to you and I ask you for advice, but yet

I don't give you any time to actually speak. How exactly

do I get advice from you? the fact is I wouldn't

because I wouldn't shut up and listen right?

The point I'm getting at is I think we need to shut up

and allow God to speak to us.

We can't make God a chore is what I said last week,

and thats the same thing we can't make him a routine,

some little song and dance we do then go on with our lives.

Do you realize we have the power to overthrow evil?

We can cast out evil spirits...

We have the power to heal...

obviously it's God giving us that power, it's God working through us..

but if we don't give him the chance to....

Look at the disciples they healed plenty of people,

they cast out evil spirits, and Jesus told them

that we would have everything we would ever need!

that we would be filled with the holy spirit and

that the holy spirit would work through us!

what? was that just for the disciples?

did something change along the way?

were the disciple the only people God could work through?

Don't you think he can work through us as well?

all things are possible correct?

God can speak to us...literally...

Just like he did with Samuel or Jeremiah,Moses or Abraham

use us like he did with David or Elijah, Peter or Paul

all we got to do is let him..

there is no secret code...there is no special prayer or hymn

or certain church you have to go to..

you don't have to know the bible cover to cover...

All you got to do is ask,ask to be that empty vessel he can work through,

ask for him to reveal his word...

ask for him to speak to you.

I don't know about you, but in my eyes what do we have to worry about..

God created the heavens and the earth surely there is no stress or worry

that he can't take care of.

Glory and praise be to him!

God first... other's second... me last.

(by the way the plan was to review Thousand Foot Krutch's new cd,

but God had other plans. I'll just say it's easily album of the year,

and I should have it reviewed fully next week, unless he decides

on me writing something else)