City Life Starter

Written by Paul Lane

The Word

“¹¹ And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, ¹² for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; ¹³ until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fulness of Christ.”

Ephesians 4:11-13 (NASB)

“²⁰ And thus Hezekiah did throughout all Judah; and he did what was good, right and true before the Lord his God.  ²¹ And every work which he began in the service of the house of God in law and in commandment, seeking his God, he did with all his heart and prospered.”

2nd Chronicles 31:20-21 (NASB)

Reflection

There is a mistake that we often make with regard to our sins.  We look back and say, “I have sinned, please forgive me of my sin,” which we should do.  But then we judge our future success by counting the number of times we sin again, when we should be looking at our attachment to that sin.  Is the attachment growing or is it falling away?

In Daunte’s “Devine Comedy” he talks about the ways love can go wrong.  In loving we often love the wrong things, or we love the right things too little or too much.  In Canto 18, he equates time with love.  That is to say, the thing that you spend time doing will be the thing you love in the end.  So, we must be about the task of finding the right thing to love and then living it with all gusto and being led by the spirit.  So, love should not be something that just happens.  It must be something done with purpose and intention.

Again, think on this.  We have many urges and desires.  We want to be wealthier.  We want to be warmer or cooler.  And we want to be more esteemed by friends, family, and the community.  So, we have an inclination to pursue those things.  And if that were all there was to us, we would simply be animals.  But God has made us a higher than the animals, and so we have reason and conscience.  This means that we have, and are accountable for, a higher love and adoration.  So, we need to be trained into what we are to be.  20 years we spend raising our children, to prepare them for their works of service.  Is there an animal that has ever taken such care in the task of parenting?  Why would anyone think that they could accomplish love on their own?

Application

Time is love, so ask yourself what you are spending your love on.  Though the businessman might claim time to be money, and the love of it, the spending of it will shape you.  So, consider your spending habits for both time and money, and you will be able to see what you are being shaped into.  Shakespeare wrote that “…we fatten ourselves for worms.”  So, the end of our bodies does not really matter much.  It is what we do with our bodies and how we spend our time that really matters.

Prayer

Dear Lord, I thank you for the time you have given me and the ability to worship you in all things I do.  I pray for your grace in learning your love.  Thank you for the apostles, prophets, evangelist, pastors and teachers you bring into my life to help me grow into the man you want me to be.  In deepest love and adoration, amen.