Corona Devo 3269

Don't take the easy way out today.  No matter what.  
We know better...we were created for better, and so we should do better today  

Sometimes it can be hard to do the right thing, and sometimes that might just mean living-out the rest of today or the rest of this minute.  But let's make the choice to do just that today.  

We live for the Lord once we ask Him into our hearts and lives...and so why would we compromise on that (holy) privilege (and permission) that God has granted us, once we have united with Him?   

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.  ~Galatians 2:20

This world offers many distractions and even addictions to withdraw us from our present reality and in attempts to tether us to alternate worlds where we don't belong.  Let's not get distracted today.

Let's choose to live life today, giving ourselves to whatever the Lord lays in front of us

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, (24) since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.  ~Colossians 3:23-24

This broken world, with so much sin and sorrow is not where we belong either, but until the day that the Lord takes us home, we are called to live here...and not to escape it.  Don't take the easy way out today.  No matter what.  

My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. (16) They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. (17) Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. (18) As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.  ~John 17:15-18

~~~

But removing ourselves from the present can be so tempting.  It's just easier to escape sometimes...isn't it? 

To ignore. 

To be apathetic.  

To become frozen.

To just be instead of actually choosing to live.

But let's not fall to those things today.  Whenever it is in our power to do right, then let's do right today, and let's not choose not to do right today.

If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.  ~James 4:17

~~~

I visited with a friend of mine from the nursing home the other day.  I like her a lot, and mentally--she is one of the sharpest whips in the facility.  This also means that we share in some lengthy conversations (where I am mostly listening), as she shares her dissatisfaction with the daily meals, but also sometimes with the care that she receives. 

On this day, she told me that a temporary caregiver had wakened her before sunrise that day, declaring, "It's time for your morphine!".  

The problem was--my friend has not been prescribed morphine, and it is not one of her medicines.  
Luckily--she knew that, and she told the nurse to recheck her file.  

The nurse gave her a hard time, but when her file was rechecked,  it said nothing about administering morphine.  

But (given this circumstance) she could have had it anyway...if she had chosen to.  

Life in a nursing home can be pretty good.  But life in a nursing home can also be pretty bad.  

Life, in general, can be either side of that teeter-totter as well.  Pain, loneliness, abuse, hopelessness and more--can mound up around us and even within us, until...we are deep in a slimy pit.  

I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry. 

(2) He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. 

(3) He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God.  

Many will see and fear the Lord and put their trust in him. 

(4) Blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, who does not look to the proud, to those who turn aside to false gods.  ~Psalm 40:1-4

Don't take the easy way out today.  No matter what.   

~~~

We know better...we were created for better, and so we should do better.  Our false gods lure and tempt and distract us into idleness and into a false-idealogy of desiring the "morphine" way of life (Muted.  Sedated.  Removed.) over real life.

But let's be reminded that our Lord gave us life so that we might live it!

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.  ~John 10:10

Even if we are given the choice to take the "morphine" way today...stay present in the Lord and in the life He has for us.  (Unless we have been medically prescribed to take morphine, in which case, go ahead and do what is best.)

~~~

My friend could have just taken the morphine that morning.  And--the truth is, each of us have that option in one way or another today as well--To tune out, or to avoid or disengage with the present reality.  There are many ways to do this., and medications (including morphine) are only one.

But don't disengage from the life that God has given us today.

Instead of living a sedated life, let's live in intentional and engaged life for our King, and with those that He has put in our paths.

Let's live for the Lord today and not choose to fade away.  The Lord has more for us today.

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.  ~Jeremiah 29:11

~~~ 

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.  ~Galatians 6:9

Blessings,

sarah 

https://sarahsundy04.blogspot.com