Say the whole thing with me today by heart:
“Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling,”
Php 2:12 NIV
Listen, not following God’s Will should lead to fear and trembling! This is the only time when “fear” is a good thing, indeed! But this does not only mean cowering before our God, as a matter of fact, once we do receive Salvation, we no longer need to cower. We must respect and revere Him, because after all He is God the mighty Creator of all hat is seen and unseen Who has just granted us the pardon of a lifetime…literally! But no longer cowering like He is going to “zap” us the moment we mess up! The Bible says we can come boldly…not arrogantly, mind you!…but boldly to the Throne of God. (Heb 4:16) In other words, we can come to Abba, our Father, whenever we want to. We have full access to Him and can have and enjoy this amazing, growing relationship with our Lord. How awesome is that!?!
Trembling might come in if we are not working out this Salvation though. Think muscles again. Unused muscles atrophy…become useless…oh, you will still go to Heaven, but you will be miserable here until you do…and you will not be the cause of others getting into Heaven either. This is NOT loving God nor being called to His purpose like we talked about two weeks ago! It leads to insecurity where we should be secure. It leads to stress where we should be relieved. It leads to chaos where we should have clarity and peace. It leads to our weaknesses being more prevalent than this New Life strength we should be growing into. So let’s choose to work out today and every day with our Trainer in every situation of life…we will be stronger, more joyful, and others will want what we have…to the glory of God!
Join me in memorizing 52 verses this year:
January: 1- Jn 3:16; 2- 2Co 5:17; 3- Jas 2:26; 4- Eph 2:10
February: 5- Jn 10:10; 6- Ro 6:23; 7- Rev 21:4; 8- Php 4:13
March: 9- 1Pe 5:7; 10- Jn 8:32; 11- Dt 30:19; 12- Jn 3:30; 13- 2Chron 20:3
April: 14- 2Chron 20:12; 15- 2Chron 20:15b; 16- 2Chron 20:17; 17- Ro 8:28
18- 1Co 13:13
19- Php 2:12
<>< Peace, Diane
