Category: Devotion of the Day

REFUGE

For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
Colossians 3:3

Some escape the tyranny of self to a great degree by a new vocation, a new love. But some day the vocation may have to be abandoned, the loved one may die. Christ offers us the highest deliverance, not in a cause of in a philosophy or even in “Christian work,” but in Himself. Some dear souls become interested in a new truth like the victorious life and make a fad of it, but still do not get through to Him who is our life.

We are dead, our old self has been nailed to the cross and we are to reckon it a fact, yield ourselves to God and obey Him. It is the message of this third chapter of Colossians as of the sixth chapter of Romans. Self does not crucify self but submits to crucifixion as the Spirit works it out in experience. But we do not major on dying, we rise from the grave to walk in newness of life, freed from the shackles of the old life.

If we lose ourselves in anything less than Christ Himself there is not full deliverance. Only “with Christ in God” are we in a safe hiding place.

LAST GOD TO GO

Lovers of their own selves.
II Timothy 3:2

Self-love takes many forms. Not only pride and vanity and worldly ambition, but a sickly preoccupation with one’s own troubles, physical or otherwise. Such self-centered, ingrown souls make themselves the center of their universe. Self thrives on attention. It grows as it is petted and coddled, until it becomes a colossus dominating one’s lives and all others it can by making friends and loved ones the slaves of such self-worshipers.

The best treatment is neglect by becoming preoccupied with something or someone else. Such ailments disappear when ignored. The supreme preoccupation is not a mere person or cause but Christ Himself. That is why He asked us to deny self, take up the cross, and follow Him. That is why He bade us lose our lives to find them. When he fills our minds and hearts and lives other gods vanish. And no god is harder to topple from its shrine than self. It will gladly give up all lesser idols if only it be allowed to retain the throne.