TRADITION TRAP

Have you thanked Him?

Have you praised Him?

Have you made it your priority to agree and cooperate with Him today?

Have you taken that deep breath and listened for what He has for you today?

ARE YOU SEEKING?

1 Timothy 2:1 (The Message)

^1-3The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know.

I spent a little time yesterday with someone who is early in his recovery. And as we were in the car, he shared a little observation. To paraphrase... he was discovering that even though he felt like he “knew” the WORD, that he “grew up” DOING church, that GOD through this recovery experience was revealing HIMSELF to him through the WORD.

He even went so far as to label his “church” experience up until now as an exercise in tradition rather than a pursuit of truth and GOD.

Boy could I relate to that.

So I have a question for us today. Is our time with GOD more about “habit and tradition” or is it about cultivating a relationship and seeking to know Him intimately?

Are we more about what we “do” (church attendance, camp in the summer) to please GOD rather than embracing a "moment by moment" focused and loving relationship with Him?

You see a healthy, growing faith is always focused on the person of God Himself. A healthy faith begins and ends in God, not in traditions, the “do’s and don’ts and duty. GOD, not religious customs, should be at the core of a robust Christian faith and is essential to a successful recovery!

Step 3 makes that clear!

Step 3: We took a decision to turn our life and will over to the care of God.

Romans 12

The Message (MSG)

Romans 12

Place Your Life Before God

^1-2 So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

I love the way Peterson puts this verse in the MESSAGE. It is about a minute by minute relationship with GOD, “our ordinary life.” There is no mention of tradition or regulations. GOD is asking us to hang out with Him but more importantly to defer to HIM for our choices, decisions, and our attention!

We are to lessen our attention from trying to perform and conform out of obligation and instead choose Christ’s way, which asks us to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul.

Mark 12:30

New International Version 1984 (NIV1984)

³⁰Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’^[a]

Simply put, GOD wants us to EXPERIENCE His love and get to know Him INTIMATELY and that takes elevating our view and perspective of HIM beyond the “subject at church” to friend, mentor, confidant and guide! That is what He wants from us!

2 Corinthians 5:20

…Become friends with God; he's already a friend with you.

So, grow closer to Him. Make Him—not your “good deeds”, customs or anyone or anything else—the focus of your life. You’ll never regret it. Focus on Him and find rest peace but more importantly THE RELATIONSHIP and friendship that will sustain you day after day!

Have a blessed weekend!

I love you all.

Freedom Church

Pastor GDelaney