Transformational Tip
The Ten Commandments deal with our relationship with God and with others. The bottom line is love. Each of these commandments holds a great deal of meaning for our lives today.
The first of the Ten Commandments calls for an undivided faithfulness to God. Because we have been created in God's image, the relationship between God and us is at the very core of our humanly needs and affects everyone.
"Other gods" usually brings to mind a wooden or stone image…or the proclaimed god of another religion. But there are subtler and more prevalent "other gods." Anything that takes our focus off Christ…anything that we devote more time and attention and allegiance to than Jesus…can become our other god. It might be money or sports or sex. It could be our job, a relationship, or even our kids or working in a ministry.
It is so easy to get sidetracked, sometimes even doing good things that we let our personal relationship with the Lord suffer. A periodic self-evaluation and reality check can be enlightening…because if you don’t check and correct, God will be checking and wanting more of you. Life usually gets more acutely uncomfortable to us when He has to show us our “other gods” and take them away than when we find them ourselves, repent, and draw closer to Him.
Today, ask yourself these questions; Am I asking God for guidance…or doing my own thing? Am I trusting in my job, another person, or my own abilities more than I am trusting in the Lord? What are the areas you have the mindset, “my kingdom come my will be done,” instead of “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done.
If you find that you have wandered off the path, confess, repent, and begin to refocus on Jesus.
Click here to share your perspective with the Stepping Stones community identifying other Gods.
Prayer
Dear Father God, Forgive me for sometimes getting sidetracked and making other things or people a more important part of my life than You are. Thanks for the grace You continue to extend to me even tho I mess up and sadden You by replacing You with other impotent and uncaring pursuits. Help me to refocus on Jesus and my relationship with You and treasure the wealth in it. I pray this and all prayers in the name of the One to whom I give my undivided faithfulness, Jesus Christ; and all God’s children say - AMEN!
The Truth
You must not have any other god but me.
Exodus 20:3
For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.
Ephesians 5:5
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
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