Are you following your calling?

Matthew 3:15 Jesus replied, "Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fullfill all righteousness"

I'm not sure about your Bible, but in my Bible these are the first words in RED.  This is the first direct quote from Jesus (at least in the ordering of the books of the Bible) in the Bible. 

Jesus came to be baptized by John the Baptizer and John said "I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?"  John's calling was to prepare the way for the Lord (Isaiah 40:3) and part of that calling included baptizing Jesus.

Are you pursuing your calling or your potential?  There are so many things each of us have the potential to do in this lifetime.  The number of things we can do, that we can pursue are endless.  We can get so caught up in that "keeping up with the Jones'" pursuit of our potential that we forget to pursue our calling. 

I think it's very fitting that the first words in red are Jesus telling John to continue in his calling to prepare the way of the Lord.  Now if John wouldn't have pursued his calling, I'm sure that God would have figured something else out, someone else would have baptized Jesus.  So He doesn't need us to pursue our calling to accomplish his work, but he wants us to pursue our calling to accomplish his work.

How much more fruitfull would be pursuing your calling versus your potential?  How much more happy would you be?

Are you following your calling?

"Let it be so now..."

Psalm 139:1-18

1 O LORD, you have searched me
and you know me.

2 You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.

3 You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.

4 Before a word is on my tongue
you know it completely, O LORD.

5 You hem me in—behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.

6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.

7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?

8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, [a] you are there.

9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,

10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

11 If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"

12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you.

13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.

14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.

15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,

16 your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

17 How precious to [b] me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!

18 Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand.
When I awake,
I am still with you.

You are a new creation...

2 Corinthians 5:17 - Therefore, if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

Ephesians 4:22-24 - You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

1 Peter 1:3 - Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

1 Corinthians 5:7 - Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast-as you really are.  For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.

Romans 6:4 - We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

Are you getting the picture?  This last weekend is all about Jesus giving us new life, making us a new creation, making us righteous through his gift of sacrifice.

ARE YOU LIVING IT?

Are you living a life worthy of the sacrifice?  Now don't think that this means living a perfect life.  There is only one who lived a perfect life; and He died on the cross for you and me. 

Are you living a new life?  Are you stiving to be more and more like Jesus everyday? 

We need to claim and live in our new identity which is a new creation through the savior Jesus Christ our Lord!  Know who you are, embrace it...live it!

God Bless.

Just imagine...

Imagine the despair of those around Him. Those who walked with Him followed Him. Imagine what they must have been feeling and thinking…the devastation they felt. We know the rest of the story, those who loved Him then…did not.

Imagine how Peter felt…he had just denied loving Jesus three times; and now he could not make amends… Do you feel this way? That what you have done was too costly, that you cannot make amends? I pray you find freedom in the gift that was freely given by Him, by freely accepting it. We don’t have to feel the despair, the hopelessness or the fear that our mistakes have been too great. We just need to believe in and accept Him.

John 8:36 - So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.