a little mid-week encouragement...

I read a passage from Galations 5 this morning out of the Message translation that I thought I'd share. I sometimes find all of the bickering, back-biting, pain, and suffering around me kind of depressing at times. It's also easy for me to fall into the same kind of behavior that I see around me. This passage reminds me of the change that can and shout take place in me when I allow the Spirit to change me.

It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time; repetetive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional baggage, frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper;an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addicitons; ugly parodies of community. I could go on.

This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inheret God's kingdom.

But what happens when we live God's way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard - things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in lfe, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. The passage goes on to tell us that we need to not just hold onto a Spirit-filled life as an idea, but work out it's implication in every aspect of our lives.

What a great summation of the Gospel of Christ. Is believing in Jesus about getting into Heaven? Well, yes that's part of it. But it's so much more. It's so much about change in your life and making the brief time we have here on Earth count.