Text: Colossians 3:15
“And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.”
Introduction
Giving thanks is one the most important things that we can learn from the Bible. Many people not have realize how important it is to be thankful to God. Though it has been repeatedly preached inside the church, people are by nature ungrateful to their creator.
Gratefulness usually comes when it is practiced regularly. In some ways it has become one of the spiritual disciplines that we should be applying and practicing all the time.
In doing this, just like a butterfly, a Christian needs to undergo a “Metamorphic Process” so that an ugly worm will come out to become a beautiful butterfly. Metamorphosis is what we call to a worm that changes to become a wonderful butterfly. And this process is we Christians really needs to be practicing.
Things to Put Off.
Fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry: 6 For which things' sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience: 7 In the which ye also walked some time, when ye lived in them. 8 But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. 9 Lying
We all know that this is not God's will for all of us. God is never happy with sin and all these things are detestable in the sight of God. This is why we need to put all these things off.
Things to Put On
Put On the NEW Man
A new man has a renewed knowledge after the image of his creator (v.10). There are two main things that we have to put on. These are:
Put On Humility
12 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering. 13 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.
All of these things talks about humility. God always promotes humility to humanity. And for this reason that His only begotten Son suffered at the cross of calvary without retaliating against the people who crucified Him. That though being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming the likeness of men (Philippians 2:5-7)
But what does humility really mean? Is humility just really confined in not retaliating when somebody hurt you? When Jesus taught things in the sermon at the mount, Jesus taught in “hyperbole”. This is where Jesus is teach about going another mile. When someone hit you on one cheek, you are not suppose to retaliate but instead, turn also the other cheek. That when someone took your tunic, we are to give also our cloak.
Some of us know that hyperbole's are really not to be treated literally because it is only pointing out to the more important thing. But to summarize all these important things, it simply means that as Christians, we are to go for another mile.
Many people thinks that this actions are impossible. Imagine that when someone slap you on your cheeks, you are to turn the other one as well? All these seems to be foolishness. But as Christians, it is something that we are to think about and suppose to be acting. With God's love and understanding the true meaning of humility, there lies the power to go for the impossibilities. After all, is is what makes us different and unique from all the rest of the people.
Put On Love
14 And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.
It is undeniable that the heart message of the Bible is LOVE. Almost everybody agrees that the heart of the Bible is John 3:16. This verse itself begins with love; “For God so love the world...”
1 Corinthians 13:13, “And now abide faith, hope, and love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” The Bible confirmed that the greatest of all characters or possession that we should have is love. Even if everybody is against us. We are still to show love. This what makes us different to the world, making the impossibilities possible.
For the world, it is impossible to love your enemies, it is impossible to give your other cheek when someone hit you, it is impossible to go to for another mile when someone forced you to carry a load for him. But all these without love, it is nothing. Indeed, nothing can ever change our world without love.
1 Corinthians 13:1-3 teaches us that all things done in kindness and humility will all be nonsense without love. Indeed, love is the real meaning of obedience to God.
Conclusion
The result of this metamorphic transformation are these:
Peaceful hearts – There is nothing much sweeter in the lives of human beings to have peace. There is no nation that does not dream of peace. There are no normal human beings that does not desire peace. Even the very ordinary people desire peace. Peace is just one result in wearing Humility and Love.
Unity – Unity. The peace that we can attain by living humble lives with love should be put forward by unity. We should be working together with unity. Putting all things together, helping one another in the ministry and creating a church where each part functions in harmonious way. Together we stand, divided we fall.
And thankfulness. - This is last of the results of this metamorphic transformation yet a very important thing to learn. This is where most of us fell in the hands of the enemy. We fail to recognize the goodness of our Lord, the provisions that he gives.
Many people have already forgotten what it means to be thanking God. We can even see that in our prayer meetings when people starts to refuse thanking God out of shyness. Not only that, sometimes, it is harder to thank God when things seems not to be working on our side. But is this the only where God works?
When we begin transforming into a beautiful butterfly, there we can see that sometimes we suffer in several occasions in our lives to become a better one, to be able to fly, enough to praise and give thanks to our Lord.
When we try to live in humility and love, then we will be able to live a life of thankfulness. A life that lives continuously count the blessings of the Father. This is what God is teaching us now, to learn how to give thanks.
No comments:
Post a Comment