I asked my dear husband to write this weeks devotion due to my hectic schedule. I was blessed as I read it. I pray that it challenges you as well.
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On the Spot
Read Luke 18:18-23, ( I dare you.)
I think about being put on the spot. I was put on the spot today, asked to do something that I really did not feel like doing. The funny thing about it is that it brought to mind almost immediately the parable of the rich young ruler. After reading this parable and asking the Lord for discernment, I began to get an understanding of the depth of sorrow that the young man must have felt. He truly wanted to inherit eternal life. I mean, he didn’t just ask Jesus how he could get it……he said “what shall I do….” This guy already had it figured that he was going to get there. He just needed to know what to do next. This is when Jesus put him on the spot.
I get asked to do things I don’t want to do. I get asked to answer for things I really don’t want to answer for. Some things happen to me in front of people I don’t want to see it. Sometimes I am made to be responsible for things I don’t care to be responsible for. Somewhere in this heart of mine is a little (don’t I wish it were little!) piece of selfishness that just wants it all to go the way I want it to go. For thirty some years I had never found myself put on a “spot” that I could not avoid, ignore, or just plain not give a darn about. One day I could no longer avoid the truth. I was put on the spot and I had to answer for the truth as I knew it. It was hard because I knew that it meant serving something other than me. It meant that I had to give up everything I had, and this meant everything, to serve another. Even today my flesh was screaming to not give in and do what I know the Lord would want me to do. So here I am.
This rich young man thought he had the answers already. He wasn’t asking because he was truly ready to commit. He had ulterior motives. Hmmm. Many times I too have these motives. But the day I ran out of places to hide from the truth I already knew was the day that God put me on the spot. I too was full of sorrow when faced with the decision to commit myself to a life for Christ. It was time to die. Nobody really wants to die. It is what made the rich young man sorrowful, I believe. Today I am happy in Christ, not in the state of my physical life and all of the things tied to it. It was a death well worth dying to be birthed again in the joy of serving a King that has a place for me in His kingdom. Every day I am put on the spot, nothing has changed about this. The difference is that I now find myself blessed to serve another, and I no longer feel the need to ask “what shall I do…..” (Luke 18:18-23)
