Will Worship
Scripture Reading: Colossians 2:20-23

Today’s Treasure: “The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it” (1 Thessalonians 5:24).

It’s the most wonderful time of the year.  Indeed, Christmas is a season unparalleled in happiness.  Fellowship, nostalgic music, gifts, and good food abound.  It’s also a season that appeals to our innate, magnetic attraction toward excess.  If there is any time of the year that requires a superhuman measure of self-control, this is it.  From the adult who’s tempted to overdo it on festive food or drinks, to the teenage girl who wants to spend too much money on her boyfriend’s present (hoping he’ll stick around longer), all the way down to the child who has seen so many toy commercials that she can’t stop adding to her wish list, we are all tempted with excess.  Beth has a word to share with us about self-control that may encourage anyone hoping to overcome excess during this most wonderful time of the year. 
-Amanda

I’d like you to see a very important truth incased in 1 Thessalonians 5:24.  Thank goodness the Word says, “The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.”  You and I cannot get our bodies and souls under continued control.  Cease trying to “get yourself together” and be disciplined in your own strength.  It is useless.  We might make it work for a little while, but failure is imminent, and when it comes, it is very destructive.  The King James Version offers some interesting wording in Colossians 2:20-23 that applies to our subject.

Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (Touch not; taste not; handle not; Which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men? Which things have indeed a shew of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body: not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh.

Notice the phrase will worship.  You see, if man could truly subdue all his fleshly appetites by the pure power of his own determination, he would simply worship his own will.  If the Word of God is about anything at all, it is about God’s will rather than ours.  Our liberty is paradoxically discovered through the will of God rather than our own.  God will never allow us continued success through our fleshly determination to “touch not, taste not, handle not.”  He knows we would end up worshipping our own wills and methods.  Through the might of His Holy Spirit released through the authority of His Word, we are empowered to say no to the things we should—to our excesses, withholdings, compulsions, and harmful consumptions—and say yes to freedom, moderation, and better health.  When we bow to God’s authority, we invite Him to take control, and He is the One who does it, as 1 Thessalonians 5:24 tells us. 

The question of authority is one we are challenged to answer every single day.  The concept of rededicating our lives to Christ only at infrequent revivals or conferences can prove disappointing and defeating.  Joshua 24:15 suggests a far more workable approach: “Choose this day whom you will serve” (emphasis mine).  Christ repeated this concept when He called us to take up our crosses daily and follow Him.  Do you want to know something wonderful?  A daily recommitment is not to ensure that we’ll never fail, but to help us develop the mentality that every day is a new day.  A new chance to follow Christ.  Obedience to God is not some diet we suddenly blow.  It is something to which we recommit every single day, no matter how we blew it the day before.  Victorious living is not an instant arrival.  It is the pursuit of one victorious day at a time until the sun sets on enough to begin forming victorious habits. 

So, are you just about to give up?  Good.  Give yourself up to God, to the authority of His Holy Spirit.  Both Galatians 5:22-23 and 2 Timothy 1:7 tell us that self-discipline is a work and a quality of the fruit of the Spirit.  Stop feeling guilty because you don’t have any self-discipline on your own.  Neither does that together-looking person next to you.  None of us can master ourselves.  Some yokes may be more obvious than others, but all of us have had them.  God is the only One who can sanctify and make every part of us whole…“And He will do it.”  All He wants is our trust, our belief, and a little time. 

Lord, according to Your Word, it is better not to make a vow than to make a vow and not fulfill it.  (Eccles. 5:5)  Please help me to realize that the power to be victorious does not come from my ability to make and keep a vow out of pure determination.  Sooner or later, I will fail if I’m only trying to fulfill a vow.  The power to be victorious comes from realizing the vow You have already made to me when You gave me Your Spirit and Your Word.  As Your Word says in Zechariah 4:6, success won’t come by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of the Lord Almighty!  Amen.

Adapted from Praying God’s Word, by Beth Moore, pages 151-152, 160.  Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2000, 2003.  Used by permission.