Prepare to WIN! -- Commitment

Friday, September 17, 2010
Read John 16:33; Luke 9:57-62
By Arlene Thomas

Serving Jesus is like driving down a dirt road. When the road is smooth, it’s easy. But when the rains come and wash away the dirt, leaving bumps and washouts, it becomes difficult.

Through the trials of life our commitment wavers. We struggle with the sacrifices of service. In today’s passage there were three people that thought they wanted to follow Christ. Jesus realized they weren’t truly willing to put aside their own ideas, plans, and desires and embrace His.

Our commitment must be whole-hearted. There’s no place in the kingdom of God for half-heartedness. Jesus rejected these three people because they didn’t really believe the rewards would be worth the cost of commitment.

Applying the Truth as an Individual
Do you think more about tangible or intangible things? Do your resources go toward building your kingdom or God’s kingdom? Where is your commitment?

Joyce Meyer wrote, “You can suffer the pain of change or suffer remaining the way you are." Are you ready to pay the cost to change? It is going to take whole-hearted commitment.

Applying the Truth as a Church
Jesus was committed to people. To what are we committed? Maintaining comfortable and beautiful buildings? Our financial statement? Or maybe we’re all about making sure things at PVBC run as we want them to?

It is extremely important that we stay committed to the word of God. But we can learn to be flexible in our approach.