" Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship."
(Romans 12:1)
We are currently experiencing a 'nor-easter'. For those of you who are not familiar with storm terminology, it's a bad one. Thankfully we have not had snow, it's only rain, but it's horizontal rain and it's bad. When I got out of bed this morning, and looked out the window, I groaned. Today is Sunday and I DID NOT want to leave the house and go out into the storm to go to church. Oh, I know I'm the pastor's wife, I have to go. Well, it goes beyond that. I go because of 49 years of trying my best to do what I know to do is right. It's ingrained in me. It's Sunday, you go to church. But sometimes it's hard.
Sometimes it's a sacrifice to do what is right. You have to fight against your natural nature that wants to do it's own thing and force yourself to do what you know you should. If you do, God will bless you. And He did today. My husband preached a wonderful sermon about submitting to the Potter's hands and the congregation was really blessed. God still shows up to church, even if we don't. So since He is going to be there, we should go too.
I know there are things that come up, but many times those things could be put off for an hour or so, that you could attend church. But in reality we are in a constant battle against our sinful nature... or we should be. It should be our desire to be more like Christ every day and Christ went to temple. It was His habit. Sadly, as a society, we too often don't fight against our sinful nature at all. We do what we want to do. We don't like to inconvenience ourselves or make ourselves uncomfortable.
But let me encourage you to strive to do what is right at all times. We're not perfect and we will sometimes fail to do what is right but God looks on the heart and He alone knows if you are truly trying your best to do what is right.
I know there are things that come up, but many times those things could be put off for an hour or so, that you could attend church. But in reality we are in a constant battle against our sinful nature... or we should be. It should be our desire to be more like Christ every day and Christ went to temple. It was His habit. Sadly, as a society, we too often don't fight against our sinful nature at all. We do what we want to do. We don't like to inconvenience ourselves or make ourselves uncomfortable.
But let me encourage you to strive to do what is right at all times. We're not perfect and we will sometimes fail to do what is right but God looks on the heart and He alone knows if you are truly trying your best to do what is right.
Great post! There is nothing more discouraging to a pastor than to work hard and receive a word from the Lord for the congregation only to look out at empty seats. If it is that saddening to us, I wonder how God feels.
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