Am I a Slave to Dress, Friends, Work or Habits?
Read 1 Timothy 6:7-9.
Who or what owns your soul?
That's really what this question is about. The things mentioned are necessary or inevitable in life. We obviously need dress/clothes, friends and work, and we will inevitably develop habits just in the way we live our lives. These things will come. The question isn't about what we choose in any of these areas; the question is about how much of ourselves we give to these things. Are these things lord of our lives or is Jesus Lord?
Don't be so quick to answer because we can easily let any of these things own us without knowing it. For myself, I know there is a danger of becoming a slave to work, and not necessarily the work which I do to earn a paycheck. Even when I'm not doing that, there is guilt that settles in if I am not doing something all of the time. There is, it seems, built into me a feeling that I must work at something from sun-up to sundown. Otherwise, I am being lazy. Or so the message in my brain goes. It's something I have been working on for some time, because I also recognize I physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually cannot keep up that pace. God has made us for something better.
Others find themselves slave to dress, constantly checking what they are wearing against the latest trends. Or we become a slave to friends when we spend more time worrying about what they think than what God thinks. And we can become a slave to habits when our routine consumes us (down that way often lays all sorts of psychological challenges).
When other things like dress, work, friends or habits begin to own our soul, we journey toward the land of jealousy—wanting a life that belongs to someone else and is not ours. As Paul pointed out to Timothy, though, we're called to be content with what we have, not spend our days yearning for what we don't have. God has not forsaken us; using up our energy to pursue what we do not have just because someone else has it or because it appears somehow better than what we have will lead, Paul says, to ruin and destruction. You know that. You've seen it happen. Maybe it's even happened to you.
Paul's most frequent description of himself is as a slave. Not to dress, work, friends or habits, but to Christ. That ought to be our self-description as well. There is only one who deserves to be called Lord, and his name is Jesus.
Who or what owns your soul?
That's really what this question is about. The things mentioned are necessary or inevitable in life. We obviously need dress/clothes, friends and work, and we will inevitably develop habits just in the way we live our lives. These things will come. The question isn't about what we choose in any of these areas; the question is about how much of ourselves we give to these things. Are these things lord of our lives or is Jesus Lord?
Don't be so quick to answer because we can easily let any of these things own us without knowing it. For myself, I know there is a danger of becoming a slave to work, and not necessarily the work which I do to earn a paycheck. Even when I'm not doing that, there is guilt that settles in if I am not doing something all of the time. There is, it seems, built into me a feeling that I must work at something from sun-up to sundown. Otherwise, I am being lazy. Or so the message in my brain goes. It's something I have been working on for some time, because I also recognize I physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually cannot keep up that pace. God has made us for something better.
Others find themselves slave to dress, constantly checking what they are wearing against the latest trends. Or we become a slave to friends when we spend more time worrying about what they think than what God thinks. And we can become a slave to habits when our routine consumes us (down that way often lays all sorts of psychological challenges).
When other things like dress, work, friends or habits begin to own our soul, we journey toward the land of jealousy—wanting a life that belongs to someone else and is not ours. As Paul pointed out to Timothy, though, we're called to be content with what we have, not spend our days yearning for what we don't have. God has not forsaken us; using up our energy to pursue what we do not have just because someone else has it or because it appears somehow better than what we have will lead, Paul says, to ruin and destruction. You know that. You've seen it happen. Maybe it's even happened to you.
Paul's most frequent description of himself is as a slave. Not to dress, work, friends or habits, but to Christ. That ought to be our self-description as well. There is only one who deserves to be called Lord, and his name is Jesus.
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