No One Like You

“Still others, like the seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke out the word, making it unfruitful.” Well, I think I’ve experienced all of these things in the past week! I think I know what it means to feel like the Word is being choked out! When we set our eyes on anything else the Word becomes choked out.  And in a way, it is hard to get back to the mind of Christ because all three pieces of this verse that explain what it means for the Word to be choked out have nothing to do with God.When we’ve looked away as Peter did, as he began to look away from Jesus when Jesus called him out of the boat to walk on water.  We sink, our hearts sink, our flesh sinks, our minds sink, everything about us begins to take a different shape. Our vocabulary is different, we are less sensitive to the real things, the real work, and the real character of God because we are being saturated by other things, the worries, deceitfulness of wealth, and desire for other things.  Yet we call ourselves CHRIST-IANS. Hmmmmm? The word Christian has become diluted but I will save that for another post! Christ followers who have been filled with worry, deceit, and evil desires.  So where do we go? How do we really align ourselves with the thoughts and actions of Christ if that is who we are trying to follow.  Or are we trying to follow the Jesus that fits our theology and our needs.  Are we trying to follow a Jesus who we think is “culturally relevant” and so then looks great to the world. Or are we just not believing that what Jesus has to offer, in his fullness, isn’t enough to satisfy our true longings and our true desires.  Its like we think that we’ve been created with these desires that only something in this world can fill.  Not Jesus.  Jesus cannot give me real peace and real fulfillment.  Hey! I fall under this category more often than not and have to repent of my ways.  I have to repent for believing that “other things” are going to give me fulfillment.  All that is for me is just not believing the evil one, that little bastard! But here’s where I think the real hard work comes in.  It becomes difficult when you constantly have to realign yourself with the heart of Christ.  It is such a wonderful exercise when we do it! But it is such hard because our pride and lack of humility comes into play. We should all be so skilled in this work-out, but I fear we as Christ Follower’s are not.  We are out of shape fatty’s.  I’m not talking about a “you gotta work hard to get back to the heart of Christ theology.” It’s actually rather simple, but you gotta repeat it a lot, well, if your me of course.  It’s kind of like going light weight with a lot of reps, it gets you cut.  Hey, and who doesn’t want to look cut? Oh, how I have to even write all of this so that I can remember today.  Thank you Jesus that you are so slow to anger and quick to love because your servants are just messed up! Forgive me when I believe that “other things” and “worries” and “da money” is going to bring me life.  Really, forgive me.  Because there is no one like you.  No one!