Examine Yourself!

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This is such a tall order for those of us who call ourselves Christians. When I was not walking in the Spirit yet, I used to wonder about how do I do this in the light of God’s Word. I know to some people it sounds stupid to ask such a question when it is written down in the Bible in black and white. So finally, I concurred with those who kept telling me the definition of this verse simply meant that everything in my life has to pass the test of God’s Word. While the explanation did not help and did not answer the “how” part of my question I assumed I had to let it go. As I learned through the Holy Spirit, to examine myself in the light of God’s Word according to His standards, I understood why it was difficult for people to answer this question properly.  Simply put, this command can leave you like a dog chasing its tail.

I realized two important things: first the awesome job of the Holy Spirit never let me be satisfied with head knowledge, always calling upon me to come up higher and draw near to God. Even though I did not know yet how to hear Him or communicate with Him. The second thing is that if you are not walking in the Spirit, then examining yourself in the light of God’s Word is as clear to your soul as someone who is born blind, yet you are telling this person to behold the beauty of the stars in the sky. Without God’s grace, there is no way I would have known that I was not examining my thoughts in the light of His Word. Every time I recall how He pursued me and never let me be satisfied with shallow understanding and my own explanations of things, I cannot help but feel privileged to be amongst those fortunate enough to be living under His grace. It is certainly not because of who I am but because of who He is.  

When you examine your thoughts in the light of His Word, the end result is you choosing to live out His truth. Not the truth according to how you see it in your own interpretation of things. But rather how He sees it.  Here is where we Christians we get in trouble, we cannot know the truth if the Holy Spirit is not revealing God’s Word to us. We cannot know the truth if our soul does not go forward possessing Christ within. In this simple command “examine yourself”, everything collides. The truth is no less than Him in all His fullness. The truth is living a righteous life, and a true righteous life means you are living in oneness with Him so you can partake in His righteousness. It also means living an obedient life, not a life where you decide on a case by case basis which one of His Word suits you best. Can you see where I am going with this?  While there are a lot of Christians out there who do not bother to examine themselves, but the majority of those who actually examine themselves are not really doing it in the light of His Word. They do it according to their own understanding; hence they keep following the wrong path, They keep doing the same wrong things over and over again and Christianity keeps declining because we are not walking as we should. Righteousness, faithfulness and obedience have to be right in the middle of our examinations.

  

PRAYER: Father God, you are indeed a great God and everything you have done, through Christ has made provision for us to walk in the light. But, we do not like the light, so we hide behind excuses which affect drastically our walk with you. I pray saviour you would revive us in our slumber to see how important meeting your standard is to you and that your Word will not come back void to you. Teach us to fear you. Do whatever it takes to bring us back to the reality of Christ’s Cross. Help us my Lord! 

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