We like to be given options.
Three bedrooms with a den, or would you rather have a fourth?
Standard or automatic in that new car?
Would you care for a corner office?
Or there’s the old fallback… Paper or plastic? We don’t hear that one as much anymore.
Do we have a spiritual option? Of course, we do. We can choose Plan A, and chase after the world’s pleasures, or we can reach for Plan B, and follow Christ.
Which will it be, Plan A or Plan B?
1 Corinthians 6:19-20 lays out the big question. Are we living for us, or for someone else?
“Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”
We’re not ours. That comes as a shock to many people. Those ears we pierce, they belong to God. That tubby waistline, God’s. Our dyed hair, again, under God’s ownership. Our lungs, God’s, even as we pump them full of nicotine, tar, and 41 other cancer-causing compounds.
Plan A: Us.
Plan B: God.
Romans 8:1 is our ray of hope:
“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
Once we belong to him, he hands the reins back to us, telling us to follow him and use our bodies well. We read this in 1 Corinthians 10:13:
“No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.”
…and in Romans 8:28:
“And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”
We can have three bedrooms and a den; a standard transmission; and that corner office. None of these are wrong, if we choose Christ first. When we have our eyes on him, the rest of our choices will fall into place exactly where they need to be.
When we plan on Jesus every day, we become part of his plan to reach unto the world with his peace and grace.
Copyright © 2017 MyChurchNotes.net
Code: FGO.K.27.16e.vp.esv