My Takeaway For 2011

As troubling as it is:

1) MOST professing Christians with whom I’ve had encounters have absolutely no conviction or desire to align their thinking and actions with the Word of God – which is the believers’ sole authority.

2) Equally stubborn to the professing Christians’ refusal to bend the knee to Scripture is their fierce argumentation of their own opinions based upon the authority of ‘self.’

3) The narrow road is getting more narrow and as a result, rather lonely.

It’s really been a year of trial and testing for me. Ultimately, I wouldn’t have it any other way for in each situation God has been gracious to further grow me in Christ. None of these situations were easy, nor were they pleasant, but I daresay they were necessary. Jesus said we must deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow Him, Jude tells us that we must contend earnestly for the faith; and sometimes the cost of doing so is high. Well, high by our human standards of measure anyway. Certainly I’ve won no popularity contests this year, yet I have had people separate from me, treat me in rather un-Christlike manner, and even bully me – all self-proclaimed believers in Christ. And I don’t mind saying….it hurts….deeply. But I do pray that the cry of my heart will be as Paul’s in that I can say with bold assurance, “I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” Phil 3:8-11

My hope and prayer for all of us who name the Name of Christ is that in the power of the Holy Spirit, we will humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God and that we will love and embrace His Word as the authority and life-giving nourishment it is, so that our minds are renewed and our lives transformed. May we boldly proclaim the truth of His Word… regardless of the cost to ourselves.