(These are the transcripts of a series of ‘Midday Meditations’ – 60-second devotionals – broadcast on Radio Cayman in April 2019)
Imagine you sit down with your spouse and they say to you something like this: “Darling, I’m committed to our relationship, you’re the one I love and I don’t want anything to come between us. But what I really need right now is to move out and start seeing other people.”
What would you think? Maybe you’d laugh at first because it was such contradictory nonsense, but if you thought they were serious you’d know right away that they didn’t love you at all, that their words of commitment meant nothing.
Now, no-one’s perfect and we all go through tough patches in our relationships but there’s a difference between being committed but struggling, and not being committed. That’s pretty much the picture with people who say that they’re a Christian but they’re content to carry on their affairs or their abuse, or their lying or selfishness – they’re living a lie.
Some people think God needs them to reach a certain standard before he’ll accept them and that’s not true – we’re all starting from different places and face different temptations, but when you see someone who says they’re a Christian and who loves to do what’s right and hates to do what’s wrong, that’s what a Christian looks like. And it’s not because we’re scared of a thumping from God if we step out of line, it’s because we love him for everything he’s done for us – we WANT to please him.
Paul T Reynolds 