Daily Encounter: A Week-day Devotional by a staff of ACTS International.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

"I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God."¹

As a kid growing up in Australia I never ever felt loved and approved of because of who I was and learned early how to get approval through the things that I did. As a teen I was fairly gifted in making things, fixing things, and doing things around our home that got me lots of approval. However, eventually I learned that all the approval in the world never made me feel loved. I'm not saying that approval is wrong. What I am saying is that if we mistake approval for love, we will never feel loved. We need to feel loved for being who we are and not for what we do.

As an adult I considered myself as a Mr. Fixit. If something went wrong, my question was always, "Okay what can I do to fix this problem?" Even in my prayers I have repeatedly prayed, "Dear God, what can I do about this problem? What can I do to help fix 'So-and-so's' problem?"

At this time we have a friend in need and I said to Joy last night, "What can we do to help our friend resolve her problem?" We couldn't think of anything that we could do that would be effective. And then it dawned on me so I said to Joy, "We're praying the wrong prayer. What we need to pray is, not what can we do, but what can we be to our friend?"

As today's Scripture teaches us, If we present our bodies [ourselves] as a living sacrifice to God ... and be transformed by the renewing of our mind, we will automatically do the will of God! The point I am trying to make is this: Being is more important than doing; that is, being needs to be the foundation for discerning what can be done. To put it another way, if we be the persons God wants us to be, we will do the things God wants us to do. In other words being needs to precede doing.

Suggested prayer: "Dear God, please help me to present my body/myself to You as a living sacrifice and therein become the person You want me to be and then do the things You would have me to do. And be and do all for Your glory and not mine. Thank You for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus's name, amen."

1. Romans 12:1-2 NKJV).

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