Just some thoughts...

I have been doing a devotional by Amy Carmichael. The Lord really blessed me the other day when I was reading it. I kind of started it in April, so I have been trying to catch up on the other days. Well, I was reading in February, and February has been on trials and difficulties just basically life in general, walking the Christian life. The one thing that really spoke to me was the fact that when we focus on our trials and on our difficulties, we are only focusing on self! How many times have I realized that…I don’t know! But anyway, I started thinking about that…you know what? It must really hurt the Lord when I do that. I know that it seems that all I ever write about is SELF. But that is probably one of the biggest battles that a Christian must face every single day. Our self gets in the way of serving the Lord. Our self gets in the way of dealing with people. Our self gets in the way in our churches. Man, our self is what satan mainly uses to bring ourselves down or others down. But anyway after all that talk, here is what she said that really spoke to me…

“Sometimes we are tempted to make much of trifles, and even to speak of our ‘sacrifices’. David Livingston suffered every sort of trial that men could suffer in opening Africa, and some of those trials he had to mention, but he added: ‘I do not mention these privations as if I considered them to be sacrifices, for I think that the word ought to never to be applied to anything we can do for Him, Who came down from Heaven and died for us.’”

By Amy Carmichael, in Edges of His Ways

What David Livingston said was what really spoke to me! What I consider to be sacrifices, are nothing compared to what Jesus did for me. We think that it is a sacrifice to give up our time to serve the Lord, to pray a little more, to volunteer to do something extra at our churches, to go soulwinning an extra day, to go to church 3 days a week--we tend to boast about what we are accomplishing or our sacrifice, but you know what? What have I done compared to what my Saviour did for me? When we complain of being too tired to complete our task or lay out of something we know we should be doing for the Lord ask yourself this…did my Saviour complain about what He did for me? Did He stop halfway or did He complete the task? The Bible says in I Corinthians 6:20, “For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.” Jesus paid an awfully high price for you and me, don’t you think that what little we have should be given and lived for Him? And that our “big” sacrifices that He asks of us, should be done for Him, forgetting self, leaving self behind, keeping our eyes on Jesus!