“I tried sit-ups once and they didn’t work.”
Sometimes we must keep doing a little thing for a long time before we see something happen. This is the essence of Christ being formed in us. Prayer is a lot like climbing a mountain. Sometimes it’s easier than others but you keep on climbing a little higher with each step. At some point you turn around and realize the entire landscape of your life has changed.
The Apostle Paul wrote of this process of Christ being formed within us as a process that sometimes involves anguish.
My little children, for whom I am again in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you! Galatians 4:19 ESV
For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. Philippians 2:13 NLT
God is working to form Christ in you over time giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. The goal is for Christ to actually be formed in us. The idea of making people behave so God will be represented well places the focus on our works rather than God’s grace and is a perversion of the Gospel.
Watchman Nee said, “God is not seeking a display of my Christ-likeness, but a manifestation of His Christ."
The life of Christ is discovered in death. The more we die to ourselves the more Christ is formed in us. The reason this is so important is because you’re only able to provide so much goodness in your own human strength.
Don’t try to be good. Learn to be dead.
When someone is hateful being the bigger person seems to be the right thing to do. However, we really should never be motivated to be bigger or better than anyone. We must learn to be broken and surrendered to Jesus enough to love no matter what is done or said.
It's easy to be kind when others are giving you kindness. When they're unkind that's when you must give them what God has given you instead. Love is not merely some kind of reciprocal affection. When we withhold affection because it has been withheld from us we call that justice but God calls that revenge.
Just as we are capable of reaction, we are also capable of response. Response requires us to learn to live a disciplined life of prayerful conversation with God. Once you experience deep fellowship with God you become more and more unwilling to allow anything of this world to hinder it.
Tracy and I built our dream home a few years back. We’re on 3 acres of land and our pinnacle view of the home looks out over trees and land with no neighbors in sight. A neighbor just on the other side of my shrubs decided they didn’t like my shrubs so they tore it all out. Shrubs on my property were removed by somebody else without my permission, without any conversation.
Now we have a nice clear view into their backyard and they have the same with us. We spent a few thousand dollars trying to remedy the situation. It all landed with the neighbor telling me that I’m being ridiculous. He then filed complaints on me with our neighborhood association for what I was doing on my property. I’m sure you’re on my side here and you support me in this. The danger is that we search for someone who supports us when we’re angry and it reinforces our emotion. So many Christians are more emotionally charged than they are spiritually mature.
What’s taking place in my heart toward a person that has wronged me reveals more about me than it does about them. You cannot offend a dead man. Often times my reactions reveal I’m just not dead enough. How about you?
Let’s be clear. Jesus, himself, said with certainty that offenses will come. The Bible gives us guidance and direction in how to handle being offended, go to the person. Ultimately God wants to use the situation in your life to deepen you, restore relationships and awaken the atmosphere of God’s Kingdom as a result. The enemy also wants to use these offenses. Don’t waste these opportunities to grow and become more like Christ who suffered and died pleading for those crucifying him to be forgiven.
Christ is being formed in us and the more he is formed in us the less willing we are to remain offended. The true measure of our faith is not discovered in loving Jesus. The true measure of our faith is discovered in loving Judas.
The more we die to ourselves the more Christ is formed in us. The life of Christ is discovered in death.
As Christ is formed in us a deep work is taking place in our hearts and lives. In this process of maturing, we learn to lessen the distance between offense and reconciliation. Maturity isn’t never feeling offended. Maturity is realizing that feelings are, by design, intended to be followers. We endanger our souls when we allow them to lead.
In our church family it actually becomes your obligation before the Lord not to let those you love get away with being offended. They may be offended with you for addressing their offense but our devotion to the Lord surpasses our devotion to the easier path in our relationships. There is something much bigger at stake. The Bible commissions us to preserve the unity of the faith.
The reason this is so important is because God is pouring out a new wine in this hour of the church and independent individualism will keep us from becoming who God’s called “us” to be. It doesn’t just affect you!
Philippians 2:12-13 …work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. NLT
The Greek phrase is constructed with a second person plural verb meaning you is actually “all of you” or the Oklahoma Greek “ya’ll”
Some places you simply cannot go alone in the Kingdom of God. If the enemy can’t take you out he’ll try to shut you down by giving you reasons to be offended, isolated and alone. It is not good for man to be alone. It is good for us to dwell together in unity (Ps 133) for there God has commanded his blessing of life forever more.
We Bring GP2RL Action Point:
Search for opportunities this week to let things go without making them known as your worship to the Lord.
Christ Formed in You
DISCUSSION GUIDE
Click here for a downloadable PDF file of this guide.
UNDERSTANDING THE SEASON: A shared meal could be the activity most closely tied to the reality of God’s kingdom, just as it is the most basic expression of hospitality. It comes as no surprise that many significant stories of Jesus are centered around a dinner table.
When Jesus wanted to explain to His disciples what his death was all about, he didn’t give them an informative lecture. He gave them a relational meal.
In a society that has grown so relationally disconnected, an invitation to Biblical hospitality might be one of the most compelling and irresistible aspects of Christianity. The heart of hospitality is about creating space for someone to feel seen and heard and loved. It’s about declaring your table a safe zone, a place of warmth and nourishment.
Great encouragement comes from rehearsing God’s Word. It is God’s plan for us to spend time drawing close to His heart and hearing His voice together as a family. This is why we start each meeting with this question first:
DISCUSSION QUESTION:
1. Where are you reading in your Bible and what are you sensing from God?
Ask each person in your group to answer the discussion questions below after reading the verses. Realize there is great power in just reading the Bible together and allowing the Holy Spirit to awaken his conversational nature in the group.
Ephesians 3:16-21 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. ESV
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:
2. Have each person give a 60 second summary of what these verses are saying, in their own words.
3. What do these verses teach us about God?
4. What do these verses teach us about people?
5. What should you do this week in response to what we are reading and what God is revealing?
6. Who comes to mind when considering a person you might share this with this week?
Everywhere we go, we bring...
GP2RL: Search for opportunities this week to let things go without making them known as your worship to the Lord.