And this world often gets …right up in our faces. I have noticed, in my own life, that one thing piles upon another and yet another until I feel swamped.. It becomes easy to despair. But I’m  learning, to live my life asking for His help.. The only way is to …“Let the peace of God be my umpire.“  What does that mean? It means I deliberately put any problem to one side in my mind, and pray my all-time favourite prayer… “help, help!”  I don’t even pray about what I think the answer might be – instead I just WAIT. I wait for peace inside me. I wait for my ideas and desperation to subside, then I simply breathe and focus on Him.

I have already resolved in my heart any internal issues about what I think I need, because I don’t want to live this life independently. I need Him more than anyone or anything else. This life does not make sense without HIM. I have found independence is overrated, it is what shoots my faith in the foot – the safest place for any difficulty to be, is in His hands. Sad to say sometimes it is easier to flail around looking for immediate relief – but I have learnt that immediate relief from pain and problems feels good, temporarily, but it doesn’t always accomplish the purposes of God. His purpose is to transform our lives and save this world. When we look at what we want, we need to ask ourselves, “Where will that fit into His greater plan?”

In the Old Testament there is an illustration that really spoke to me – it is in Exodus 21:5 – “But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free, then his master is to bring him before the judges, And he shall take him to the door or doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he shall serve his master for life…”’ This excerpt is talking about a servant voluntarily becoming a love-slave. It is part of the law handed down by Moses from God – remember, the law is a good thing, Jesus said so. He didn’t come to change any of it – He came to fulfil it – and He did. Somebody needed to be punished for our disobedience and sin and He volunteered. Jesus became our offering before the Father, forever.

Back to my verse in Exodus 21:5. In those days, like I said, a servant who truly loved their master could choose to remain a slave. This was a lifetime thing, the master put the slave’s ear against a doorpost and put an awl through his earlobe – the awl left a big hole in his lobe that never went away. Choice seems important to human beings, and God is so kind to us, He will not make us do anything. However, we can choose to become His love-slave… And no, He won’t pierce our ears! Fashion already does that!! 😂

Because our choices are so powerful, at any time we can live out our Christian lives in lip-service –  instead of faithful, devoted service to the King. Lip-service is about living this life the way we want to. Being a love-slave is about putting the Holy Spirit in charge and then actively reading the bible looking for things to do, and repenting about the things we don’t. Transformation becomes our way of life. We understand that difficulties are the vehicles that God uses to strengthen our loyalty to Him. Faithful service is not simply doing the things that are convenient to us, it is laying down our lives, minute by minute, like Christ did, to do the Father’s will.

A love-slave lives to do his master’s will. He is so devoted to the master, that whatever his master wants becomes that person’s first priority. Christianity is not only about reading the bible, praying, and serving the church – Christianity is about becoming a loving, living illustration of that bible to everyone around us. To do that, His book has to operate on our hearts, thoughts and actions with our permission and co- operation. 

Remember, co-operation means the Holy Spirit and I do this together. It means I yield whatever I want, or the things that suit me, to live this life He gave me, however He wants. PS: personally, I don’t always like it when the Holy Spirit brings up something that needs to be changed in my actions or reactions  – but afterward… I LOVE IT. He knows how to live my life wa-a-y better than I do! And I adore watching what Jesus does with my teeny, tiny little LIFE/LUNCH – I’ve seen Him ‘feed’ lots of people on the smallest effort from me.

Jesus spoke to some ordinary men He met, men who didn’t even know Him. They became His disciples. He said: ‘Come and follow Me.’Right now, the Holy Spirit is saying that to every single Christian on this planet. He knows the WAY we should go! Just give up your own plans for your life and learn to follow Him. This is how our faith becomes REAL. 👋🏻