For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose. (Philippians 2:13)
When we strive to do and be for God out of a sense of our own goodness, we fail. The things that we see as good in our lives apart from God are humanistic reasonings. When we serve God out of knowing that He and He alone is all that is good in us we start to realize just how much we can not survive without Him. All of the good works and humanitarian acts that we do for others are made null and void without Jesus in our lives. The Pharisees saw themselves as holy and righteous out of doing deeds and acts. Jesus Himself said that they were like white washed tombs. They look clean and in order on the outside but inside they were dead, smelly and rotten.
We need to remind ourselves that we can not take any credit for our place in the body of Christ. It is He and He alone that works in us to do the things that He desires us to do. His will and ways are opposite to the desires of mans heart, but through His Spirit dwelling in us, we are empowered to accomplish and flourish in doing His will! Jesus has saved us all from eternal death, sin, torment and hell. What is due Him is all glory, honor, riches, wisdom and strength. As soon as the mindset starts to show up of’ “look what I have done”, cast it down for that is pride. In ourselves, anything that we accomplish is meaningless without Jesus being glorified and lifted up. It is through Him and Him alone that we can do all things.
One of the most difficult things to walk out in this life is the dying of self. Dying hurts and God’s word tells us that we must crucify the flesh daily, which means that every day our selfish nature needs to be overtaken out of our choice and crucified with all the old ways of thinking and doing. This is accomplished with help of the Holy Spirit. We are not left alone to do these things, our Helper is with us. Give glory to God for all He has done and keep in mind that all of where we are in Christ is because of Him and Him alone!
TMMC-The Teaching Ministry of Michael Cannatello
