Before we begin, I just want to say if you are on Day 11 of this challenge, following the commitments to the best of your ability, you are doing something special! Consistency is a rare trait today! You are seeking God and I hope this time has been a time of increasing joy day by day as you willingly draw near to Him!

I was reflecting on this when talking to my wife and I said, “I do not know how to explain it, but I simply feel like I have finally been placed in the right spot.” As I am going about my day, not just during my exclusive times with God, I feel right… everything I do comes with a different sense of ease that I lack the words to explain. Does anybody know what I mean?

Anyway, today’s reflections by David Nasser on the passage above are my favorite so far! (so expect lots of quotes)

No matter what you do, you are a slave to something.

If you follow your passions you are a slave to your desires and they are a hard taskmaster that marches you to an unforeseen cliff. You may have seen the fruits of death in the pursuit of your desires and yet you push on to scratch the same itch that only gets worse.

Did you find an answer to the question, what are you searching for?

Did the Spirit open your eyes to the negative results of your chasing of this thing? 

How long did it take before your mind began assaulting you with excuse after excuse to remain the same? How long before your body went into the seemingly automatic response to seeking it again even while another part of you is, “saying there is no good reason to keep going this way!”?

What a cruel master sin is.

“The sins of lust, greed, envy, and jealousy gnaw at our hearts like a cancer. They cut off the life-giving flow of the Spirit in our minds… Spiritual vitality is drained away until ultimately, we don’t respond to God’s voice. Instead of forgiveness, we are crushed by guilt. Instead of thankfulness, we are bitter at God and at others who have hurt us. Instead of sensing God’s presence, we feel alone and empty. Instead of seeing God use us to change lives, we realize we have become millstones that drag others down. That’s spiritual death. That’s the effect of letting sin be our master.” (David Nasser, Day 11 of A Call to Die)

But we can have a new Master! One who drives us forward through kindness and forgiveness into life!

“When Jesus is our master, our minds are absorbed with pleasing Him and advancing His kingdom.”

This is the place every Christian will long to be in! 

Am I saying that this is a requirement for salvation? No. 

I am not saying that a Christian MUST live in this pursuit. I am saying they WILL live in this pursuit.

Paul Washer puts it this way (quoted from memory so I may be off on the exact words),

“An apple tree does not twist and bend over backward straining to produce apples, it produces this fruit because it is an apple tree, that is what it does.”

When we came to faith in Christ, there was a process called Regeneration,

When we died to sin we were made alive in Christ. We were blind and now we see. We were deaf to spiritual realities and were made to hear and understand truth. 

Paul puts this in a variety of ways in the Scriptures,

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come…” (2 Corinthians 5:17)

“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.” (Romans 6:1-6)

“…put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Ephesians 4:22-23)

This is not merely a New Testament way of thinking but was prophesied in the Old Testament,

“And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” (Deuteronomy 30:6)

“And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God.” (Ezekiel 11:19-20)

What this looks like in a believer’s life is complex and varies. While this is an instant spiritual miracle, it is also carried out through the process of sanctification (which we talked about earlier). You see in the Old Testament and in the New Testament both the proclamation of this new creation and the urging to be this new creation (look at Jeremiah 4:4 and the words of Ephesians 4:22-23 again).

This may seem like I am veering off-topic, but this is crucial to understand, or else we will fall into legalistic thinking and try to earn God’s forgiveness. This striving leads back to shame and a burden we can’t carry (Jesus did that for us). Understanding regeneration allows us to have joy in our serving Christ. It is a reality that changes the way we view our service to Him.

David Nasser gives us 3 things we can do to be effective in serving Christ as our master. I am going to add a fourth thing.

1. Recognize “you have been bought with a price.”(Our forgiveness came through the hefty price of Jesus’ suffering through His life and death on the cross – God’s kindness leads us to repentance): In Christ, we take the role of a “bondservant” who once owed a great debt, but on the day he was to be set free (debt paid in full) he decides to remain a bondslave to his master because of the  love he has for his master and because he “wants to continue to enjoy his master’s love and kindness.” 
2. Release your grip on sin: The more you pursue this goal, the more you realize your need to cling to Christ and the more beautiful His decision to die for you becomes.
3. Realize that all you have is a gift from God: This is crucial in walking with Christ because it not only increases our gratitude, but it loosens our grip on the things we own.
4. Keep your mind set on the reality of eternity: This life seems less urgent when we know that we are going to live forever in a better life afterward. We can let go of hard times because we know that our precious time is not limited to the few years we have here. We can have significantly more peace in knowing that everything that happens here serves a bigger purpose. We can move with a different kind of urgency and goal in life knowing that those who do not believe have a limited time to change that by coming to know Christ – which we are called to communicate to them through our words and actions.

I want to wrap up with another quote from David Nasser on how recognizing that we have been bought with a price can change our perspective on good times and hard times: 

“

• When I feel alone, I can pray, “Lord, I belong to You, and I know I’m not alone in this situation.”
• When I’m bored and my mind drifts into fantasies of a more thrilling life, I can pray, “I belong to You, Lord, and you have the right to determine my circumstances. Teach me lessons of faithfulness today.”
• When things are going great, I can pray, “I belong to you, Lord, and I realize that you are the source of all good things.”
• When I feel hurt and anxious, I can pray, “I belong to you, Lord, and I know you are going to work this out for good in some way. I trust you.” “