Which Jesus do you follow?
Which Jesus do you serve?
If Ephesians says to imitate Christ
Then why do you look so much like the world?
-from Todd Agnew's My Jesus
Which Jesus do you serve?
If Ephesians says to imitate Christ
Then why do you look so much like the world?
-from Todd Agnew's My Jesus
It is not at all a coincidence that it has been almost a year since I posted here last. I've fallen out of relationship with Christ and become all too focused on this world since then.
We attend church and Sunday School. I still go to Circle. I even sing in the choir now. What I don't do is study the Bible, teach Sunday School, or pray regularly.
What I have been doing is listening to obscene music, watching too much television and spending too much time on the computer looking for approval from people I don't really know. I have made a lot of excuses for the sinful behavior of others based on my desire to be tolerant. I have enjoyed humor that is off color. I gossiped. In all ways, I have fallen short. Way short.
This Sunday, I actually taught Sunday School for a friend who was going to be out of town. The scripture was from Ephesians. The Ephesians mentioned in the Todd Agnew song that I quoted above...a song I had not heard until today. Read Ephesians 5:1-20. It convicted me. It opened my eyes to what I have been doing versus what I should be doing. Scared straight? I hope so.
Something else happened Sunday. Part of our Sunday School lesson discussed the difference between being baptized by the Holy Spirit and being filled by the Holy Spirit. We are baptized by the Holy Spirit without any action of our own but we have to take steps to be filled. If we have any unconfessed sin, we have not given over complete control to Him and He can't fill us.
This was heavy on my mind as we sat in church and prepared for communion. I was praying about this as I knelt at the rail, offering up the sins I had refused to admit before. The preacher dismissed us, the choir, from the altar rail with a prayer that for once did not mention one thing about the gift of music.
Instead, his brief prayer asked for us to be filled with the Holy Spirit. I felt as if that was spoken right to me by Christ.
