Nehemiah 3
If you are going to participate in God’s magnificent purpose for the world and for an individual like you, then it must start with you facing up to the true condition of your personal spiritual condition.
First, you have to see whether you are a follower of Christ at all. “Christian” is not some category or label that is personally defined. God and you must decide whether you are on his side and committed to his Son. You might find that the evidence that satisfies you or well-meaning people around the church is not satisfactory with God. He examines much more closely. He probes and sifts the heart and examines the motives. He knows very well whether your spirit is alive or dead. He is not fooled by outward talk - he knows whether he lives in your spirit or not! If you are at all uncertain whether God has your heart, then take David’s words in Psalm 139 to God:
Search me, O God, and know my heart! Test me and know my thoughts! See if there is any grievous (that is, offensive) way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!
Stop trying to prove your status as a Christian by stirring your efforts to attend meetings or to give up drinking, or to switch off pornography, again and again without success. Take your heart to God – your heart which he sees and knows intimately. Ask for his deep, deep searching, probing and convincing of your heart so that you will know why you must have Christ in you or be irretrievably and miserable lost.
And if you are a Christian, each of us needs to take a quiet, personal trip around the walls of our lives to see where the enemy is coming in; to see where we have neglected to build; to see where our previous faithless efforts at improvement have caved in. The way to do this it to take a torch with you. That torch is the Word of God. Start exposing some of these key areas of your life to the light of the Bible and let the Holy Spirit show you where you need to urgently rebuild what is broken down.
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