Where Do My Loyalties Lie?: Top 25 Jesus Quotes: #13

Something about watching romantic comedies makes us relationship gurus.

We can see potential threats to fidelity and loyalty from a mile away...within the unrealistic confines of one of Hollywood's steadfast genres.

• "No! Don't go out with him! Can't you see he doesn't really care about you?"
• "That guy better stop hanging out after work with her..."
• "What are they THINKING??!?"

But when it comes to real life, we struggle a bit.

In fact, we struggle so much that it wouldn't hurt to get the 13th quote about Jesus (on azquotes.com's top-25 list) put on a pair of contact lenses so it was always in front of us:

"Beware of anything

that competes with your loyalty

to Jesus Christ."  -  Oswald Chambers

Truth is...Whether it's commitment to a sports team or loyalty to a job or even dedication to a particular idea about Jesus, anything that takes precedence ahead of allegiance to the actual person of Jesus is a foundation of shifting sand.

P.S. You are invited to have Chambers' "My Utmost for His Highest" daily readings actually read to you by checking out the "My Utmost for His Highest Daily Reading" Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/UtmostReading)

Or...you could subscribe to this blog's author's YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/user/deweyroth/featured)

The Crux of the Matter: Top 25 Jesus Quotes: #15

Number 15 on our hit parade of quotes about Jesus comes to us from the well-known pen of Oswald Chambers. His book, My Utmost for His Highest, was first published in 1927 (ten years after his death), has never been out of print, and remains a top-seller in devotional literature.

The thought being featured today is this:

"The center of salvation is the Cross of Jesus, and the reason it is so easy to obtain salvation is because it cost God so much."

Don't misunderstand. To say that salvation is easy to obtain is certainly true, but it doesn't mean that fleshing that out on a day-by-day basis is a stroll in the park. There's probably a good reason Paul tells us to "work out your salvation with fear and trembling." (Philippians 2:12)

In fact, in the very next verse, Paul is kind enough to tell us that good reason. It's because "it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose."

The creator of all that exists is working within me to accomplish His purpose. Just as He was working through Jesus Christ by sending Him to the cross. If that doesn't fill me with a fearsome sense of awe and enough wonder to set my knees to knocking, what will?

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

Truth is..."Never forget what Jesus did for you. Never take lightly what it cost Him. And never assume that if it cost Him His very life, that it won't also cost you yours." (Rich Mullins)

What Did You Become at School Today, Johnny?

So there's no misunderstanding, the title "What Did You Become at School Today, Johnny?" is not meant to imply that this post will be a disparaging diatribe on how the educational system in the United States has turned from teaching skills or knowledge and is more focused on indoctrinating the young in the ways of political correctness and the celebration of all things except traditional, Judaeo-Christian values.

Not that I couldn't spend some time ranting about that.

No. Instead, I'd like to bring to our attention a quote from Oswald Chambers.

"We are apt to think that everything that happens to us is to be turned into useful teaching; it is to be turned into something better than teaching, into character. We shall find that the spheres God brings us into are not meant to teach us something but to make us something." ~ Oswald Chambers, "The Love of God: An Intimate Look at the Father-Heart of God", Discovery House

Truth is...Yahweh has never been a tyrant demanding adherence to a set of ideas or a list of rules. It's always been about relationship and the condition of the inner person. " The Lord doesn’t see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." (I Samuel 16:7 NLT)

Little Worries

With apologies to Roy Orbison:

Little Worries

Picking at my brain

Little Worries

Driving me insane

Little Worries

Don't know why you bug me so

Wish that you would up and go

(Mercy)

Little Worries

Giving me such grief

Little Worries

I get no relief

Little Worries

Even though you don't make a peep

Every night I'm losing sleep

(Yawn)

Little Worries, stop a while

Just a pause could make me smile

I'm so tired of your bile, you see

Little Worries, yeah, yeah, yeah

Little Worries, please don't stay

Little Worries, go away from me

'Cause I hate you; you treat me bad

With all your nagging, you make me sad

Little Worries

Just walk on by

If you left me

I wouldn't cry

Little Worries

Just walk away, hey...okay

If you left you'd make my day

I guess I'll have to work it out

Build my faith and not my doubt

Do I believe?

Is God looking out for me?

Yeah, He knows what's best for me

Oh, oh, Little Worries.

Truth is...It is not only wrong to worry, it is unbelief; worrying means we do not believe that God can look after the practical details of our lives, and it is never anything but those details that worry us. Have you ever noticed what Jesus said would choke the Word He puts in us? Is it the devil? No - "the cares of the world" (Matthew 13:22). It is always our little worries. (Oswald Chambers)

Chambers Refuses To Be Condensed

Almost every morning, I post on my personal Facebook timeline a quote from that day's reading in the devotional classic, My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers. A few weeks ago, the reading was so rich...so full of exquisite truth...I just couldn't leave anything out in order to create a two-sentence pithy statement.
 

THE DOORWAY TO THE KINGDOM
"Blessed are the poor in spirit..." (Matthew 5:3)

Beware of thinking of our Lord as only a teacher. If Jesus Christ is only a teacher, then all He can do is frustrate me by setting a standard before me I cannot attain. What is the point of presenting me with such a lofty ideal if I cannot possibly come close to reaching it? I would be happier if I never knew it. What good is there in telling me to be what I can never be - to be "pure in heart" (5:8), to do more than my duty, or to be completely devoted to God? I must know Jesus Christ as my Savior before His teaching has any meaning for me other than that of a lofty ideal which only leads to despair. But when I am born again by the Spirit of God, I know that Jesus Christ did not come only to teach - He came to make me what He teaches I should be. The redemption means that Jesus Christ can place within anyone the same nature that ruled His own life, and all the standards God gives us are based on that nature.

The teaching of the Sermon on the Mount produces a sense of despair in the natural man - exactly what Jesus means for it to do. As long as we have some self-righteous idea that we can carry out our Lord's teaching, God will allow us to continue until we expose our own ignorance by stumbling over some obstacle in our way. Only then are we willing to come to Him as paupers and receive the first principle in the kingdom of God. The underlying foundation of Jesus Christ's kingdom is poverty, not possessions; not making decisions for Jesus, but having such a sense of absolute futility that we finally admit, "Lord, I cannot even begin to do it." Then Jesus says, "Blessed are you..." (5:11). This is the doorway to the kingdom, and yet it takes us so long to believe that we are actually poor! The knowledge of our own poverty is what brings us to the proper place where Jesus Christ accomplishes His work.

Truth is...while we talk in terms of submitting to Jesus and humbling ourselves under his Lordship, there's an awful lot of getting-from-him-what-we-really-need involved...could almost be considered selfish on our part.