I heard a teaching by Rick Warren on the decision to follow Christ. I won't be able to provide his exact quote, but it was something like, "The Christian life is a decision followed by a process." I'd like to add to this a reminder to let these two pieces come one at a time.
Friends, I am SO prone to feeling like I need to be perfect before I can come to Jesus. And, yeah, my initial surrender and salvation are one time events that I don't need to revisit, but I do it in lots of other ways too. I sometimes feel like I need to "understand" something or see it with a certain level of clarity before I can take it to the Lord.
I'm not sure exactly how to explain this strange process, but I can say with some certainty that it's rooted in a certain lack of humility. As if God needs me to "get it" in a certain way in order for Him to use it. As if, for that fact, I can get it in the way God gets it. Shoot. I mean, truly, I have to remind myself that there is a God, and that I'm not it!
So, in that same line, I was pondering this little bit of wisdom from Pastor Warren today, and reminding myself that in the little daily ways, this is also the way it goes. I decide to do what God wants; I surrender my will to Him, and I yield control to Him. Then I let that process unfold, both receiving the help He gives, and taking the actions that are mine to take. Eventually, I end up in that place that I sometimes think is the starting point. It's not.
Just a reminder... He takes us as we are, and we should take to Him - in all things - just the way we are today. Where He takes us from there is for Him to show us through His leading; we don't have to figure it out in order to get there. We just follow.
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