YOU ARE NOT YOUR OWN!

“Do you not know…you are not your own…therefore, honor God with your body.”

(I Corinthians 6:19-20)

This was my Word from The Lord this morning during our time together.  The whole Scripture I posted earlier and I posted on the first day, Monday.  Today the above parts of the verse hit home to me.  I actually shared this same verse on Wednesday night at church with emphasis on the part that “you are not your own.”  We don’t have the right to decide on what we want to eat; or what we want to do; or where we want to go; or who we want to interact with!  IF we are born again of The Spirit and He is dwelling within us, we ARE changed – the old me is passed away and a new me now lives in my flesh.  Galations 2:20 says:  “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless, I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.”

Some of us know this intellectually and believe it in theory.  The reason I say that is because we don’t know it experientially and believe it because it is a reality in our life, and there is evidence of a changed person who resembles Jesus in character.

The hardest thing to do in this life is to surrender my will; my right to myself.  As I have read, studied and taught God’s Word for the past 30 years, I have committed my total life to God as much as I know how.  I have done this at least three times, each time believing it was done.  I have sincerely desired, begged and pleaded with The Lord to make it complete; to make me truly a new creation.  I believed His Word said it was His desire, and if it was His desire and my desire how come it didn’t seem to be a Reality to me?  My conclusion as of today is this:  FAITH has many dimensions of forsaking all!  Try to follow me for a moment as I have tried to sort this out…My faith as a 14 year old when I first learned that death was not final; the end to life, that there is a Heaven and a Hell and we will live after death in one of those places.  I learned that my relationship with God was the determining course and it was paved by Jesus and His shed blood that paid for the sin of the world that separated us from God.  With as much faith as I had at that moment, I gave my life to God believing all that I had learned. 

That faith as a 14 year old developed over the next 20 years as God introduced people into my life who taught me the disciplines of being a Child of God.  I believed my faith was strong enough that I could overcome any encounter with the evil world.  I was wrong!  I wasn’t prepared and my faith was not enough because evil spirits didn’t come with an obvious attack; they came slowly, subtly, infiltrating under the guise of good and loving, taking on the form of Godliness.  I believed it was God bringing into my life more than I ever imagined could be possible.  Then GOD,  to whom I belonged caused my disguised world to come crashing down and revealed the truth!  I couldn’t believe I had fallen for the lies and deception.  I hated myself for failing God and I hated the demonic world for having penetrated my faith.  I fell on my face to the floor and wept uncontrollably seeking God to forgive me and cleanse me and make me my best me for Him that it is possible for me! 

My faith took on a new and different dimension.  The Jesus I had learned about from reading The Bible and going to church and Bible Study groups; that I believed died for the sin of the world and gave eternal life to those who believed; I saw very differently.  I now knew that He didn’t just die for the sin of the world, but that He died for MY sins!  Now I believed in Him because He had become my Lord and we had a personal loving relationship.  Real Love that I never thought existed but in fantasies.  My new relationship with God opened up a whole new world of getting to know Him.  He began to teach me deeper meaning to the basic introduction to being a Christian.  He now started teaching me what it was like to be His Disciple and “present my body as a living sacrifice…not to be conformed to the world, but to be transformed by the renewing of my mind that I may prove what is the good, acceptable and perfect will of God.”  (Romans 12:1-2) To reinforce my training, He gave me a group of young people to teach what I was learning about how to be a Disciple of Christ and to have a total life commitment.

My faith was now different than at salvation and after falling from grace.  A whole new realization of God and my relationship to Him developed as I discovered my spiritual gift of teaching and He privileged me to teach youth, adults, and leaders in many places.  For 20 years I taught His Word a chapter a week in my Sunday School class and challenged myself and those in my class to make His Word a living part of our lives. 

Two years also The Lord impressed upon me that we needed to focus our attention on the Reality of His death, resurrection and ascension; and His instructions about what His disciples were to do after He left and until He returned.  We started with studying the book of Matthew where He gave what we call The Great Commission and telling us “He had all power and He would be with His disciples always, and to go and teach all nations the things He has commanded.” (paraphrased Matthew 28:18-20); and then beginning in Acts, He told His disciples to “go into Jerusalem and wait until the Promise of The Father would be given.  He said they would receive power after the Holy Spirit came upon them and would be witnesses unto Him from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.”  (Acts 1:4-8)  The rest of Acts tells what happened when The Holy Spirit came upon those disciples and how The Church was formed of all Believers in Jesus Christ.  Then we studied the Letter to the Ephesians that thoroughly tells us as Believers how to live and the marvelous blessings we have.  We finished our study in 1 & 2 Peter where he tells us “we are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people that should show forth the praises of Him who hath called us out of darkness into His marvelous light.”  I Peter 2:9)

As a result of this study, I personally wanted to experience the indwelling Holy Spirit and the power to fulfill all that Jesus gave us to do until He comes back for us.  I knew the facts, and I believed them, but I wasn’t living them the powerful way that the early disciples did.  My church is not functioning like the early church.  I challenged myself and my class that we seek The Lord about experiencing what the early church did that day in Jerusalem on Pentecost when they received the power of God in the form of The Holy Spirit.  Their lives were changed totally and completely in that moment and they never went back to who they were before. 

I’ve been seeking the Reality of this Power, and today the Holy Spirit reminded me that “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own, you were bought with a price.  Therefore honor God with your body.”  Do you not know?  You are not your own!  Honor God with your body! 

Hello!  You don’t have the right to do your own thing!  Jesus bought you!  The Holy Spirit and Power of God lives in you!  So, why isn’t He obvious?  Stretch your faith and your will and let Him have residence in your WHOLE body and life.  He won’t make you.  You must give Him your life as an offering, putting to death your rights.  He then WILL change you never to be the same again.  You WILL be a witness unto Him wherever you go; as you go about wherever you are, you WILL tell others what you have learned about Him.  You WILL deny self, take up your cross and follow Him under the power of His Spirit that lives in you!!!  You WILL ask Him what He wants in His body to eat and drink; you WILL ask Him what He wants His body to wear to give Him honor; you WILL ask Him where He wants to go each day, and what He wants to do through you; you WILL honor Him in all situations and give Him your very best for His glory!! Amen…

So, with as much faith as I have right now, in this place, with as much of God as I know, I give Him the life He purchased with His blood to make me Holy as He is Holy!

Lord of my life, search me and see if there is anything in me that is unclean and unholy; and cleanse me and make your temple as magnificent as you desire.  I ask that your mind be my mind; that your heart be my heart; that every manifestation of who you are be a Reality in my life; that we would be One, and You only seen.  I don’t know what I ask, but whatever it takes for my will to break that’s what I’m willing to do.  I want to be about doing what You said your followers should be doing in the power of Your Holy Spirit so that I can be found blameless at your coming. Amen.