Awakening

"For You and You alone, awake my soul, awake my soul and sing. For the world You love, Your will be done, let Your will be done in me!"-Chris Tomlin: Awakening

I've been listening to this song quite often the past few days. I believe it's one of those songs that will never get old to me. I also feel like there is incredible power in a prayer like that. For You and You alone. Do we really understand that statement? There are hundreds and hundreds of things throughout the day that can draw our attention and stir our affection. Is the main one Jesus? In Luke chapter 6 Jesus is giving His sermon on the Beatitudes and comes to a point where He begins to talk about how "every tree is known by its fruit..." What kind of fruit are you producing? At the end of this section in verse 45 Jesus says, "...For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." What are we speaking? Are we speaking the things of God, or are we speaking something else? For a long time I struggled with positive speak. Proverbs 18:21 tells us that the power of life and death are in the tongue. Do we really believe that? If we do, are we practicing speaking life, or death? Just speaking in faith the words, "For You and You alone, awake my soul" can have tremendous impact in your life. So that brings me back to my original point. There are many things in this world that are trying to steal our attention and stir our hearts. I believe that the problem lies initially in our noggins. We don't understand that we have the mind of Christ; 1 Corinthians 2:16 tells us that.

I believe that satan's biggest place of attack is in mind sets and in thoughts. When we think of something we automatically believe that those thoughts belong to us. What if that thought was planted there by the devil and he is just trying to get you to continue thinking about it until you act upon it? If we are saved, set apart, sanctified, blood bought, and forgiven sons and daughters of God I firmly believe that vulgar, profane, perverted thoughts are not brought on by the mind that Christ gave us. If they were, then He wouldn't be a very good God would He? I believe that the way one thinks and the way one believes is more important than the way one acts. If you can get someone believing right then their actions will follow. Satan wants to fill our minds with clutter. His objective is to get you to think of yourself as a sinner, and to eventually get yourself professing that you are indeed a sinner. Friends, I am here to tell you, you are an over comer! You are worth much more than the world gives you credit for. It's time that we exchange the old mindset and the old way of thinking for the new mind of Christ!

My prayer every day is that God would renew my mind. It says in Romans that we are not to conform to the ways of this world but be transformed by the renewing of our minds! I feel like many times we are content with living our lives blending in with our surroundings. We are spiritual chameleons. Whoever we are with, that's who we act like. For years I fought that fight. I was whoever I was with. Then I realized how absolutely BORING that life is! There's no adventure to living a life as a copyist. My pastor has started a year long initiative and vision to live life as a risk taker. In order to live as a risk taker we must THINK like risk takers. In order to think like a risk taker we have to allow Christ to come in and do an overhaul. A wise man once said, "Sow a thought, reap a word. Sow a word, reap an action. Sow an action, reap a habit. Sow a habit, reap a life style. Sow a life style, reap a destiny." Your destiny will be shaped by the things you think!

I'm so tired of seeing "Christians" live life in the shadows and take the back seat to the world and flow along with the current. We are hypnotized by the rhythm of pop-culture and its schemes. It's time for some risk takers to stand up and decide that THIS ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH! Take a chance! "For You and You alone, awake my soul!"

It's my prayer that God would alter your mind set. It's my desire to see Christians truly pursuing the lover of their souls the way He pursues them! Jesus let there be a spiritual awakening in our lives. Let us see what You see, and let us take a stand. Let us be foolish for You. Let us refuse to follow the crowd. Don't let us be content with coexisting with our enemy the devil. Give us our candle, let us run into the darkness. For You and You alone.