SHINE BRIGHTLY FOR CHRIST

GOD is just absolutely amazing! It still blows me away when HE tells me to do something and I just know beyond any doubt that it is HIM talking...to me!!! It's after midnight, I'm reading a book and clear as day I have the thought...Get your Bible. I read a couple more words and again it's...Get your Bible. So I get up and get it and I'm thinking...okay but I don't know where to read. There it is again...that still small voice...Philippians. I'm thinking, okay...but where. I turn to Philippians and right there on the top of the page is the heading; Shine Brightly For CHRIST...chapter 2:12. I'm thinking "maybe" that's not it. So I turn backwards another page and start at the beginning of chapter 2. Nothing. I knew that what I was reading was not "it". I read on. When I got back to the heading, "Shine Brightly"...I knew that was it. Actually the middle of verse 12.

Philippians 2:12-16 (New Living Translation)

Shine Brightly for Christ

 ¹² b. Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. ¹³ For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.

 ¹⁴ Do everything without complaining and arguing, ¹⁵ so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people. ¹⁶ Hold firmly to the word of life; then, on the day of Christ’s return, I will be proud that I did not run the race in vain and that my work was not useless.

WOW!! I can't believe this is not highlighted and there is no little flag on the page! You see in all my Bibles if I highlight the verse I most always  put a "post-it" flag on the page. That way when I am having a bad day and don't know what to read I just pick up a Bible and turn to all the flagged verses and read them. There is always at least one that works for what I need to hear that day. So...back to what's important...

GOD wants me to know HIM deeper. HE wants me to "just do" what I know HE is telling me to do. Which is...read HIS WORD, talk to HIM more, and write what HE tells me to write. HE sent HIS SON JESUS to save me from a life of despair, and certain death in the end, to tell everyone I could about what believing in JESUS as my LORD and SAVIOR has done for me. This whole passage fits so well! HE has done a tremendous work in my life and is continuing to work in me, and change me, daily.

HE wants us all to know HIM deeper. None of us should ever worry about what others may think or say about us when we are doing the LORD'S work. What people say about you, or what you do for HIM, can't hurt you. But...not doing what GOD tells you to do...can! Like the verse says, live your life so you shine brightly for CHRIST. Don't live like the world. When we see CHRIST face to face we want HIM to say to us...

Matthew 25:23 (New King James Version)

²³ His LORD said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your LORD.’

My final thought is...

Make GOD proud of you. Live a life pleasing to HIM. You are the only one that can do what GOD planned for you to do. No one's journey with HIM is like yours. Make yours count for CHRIST!!