Even If i Walk Alone

Instructing and encouraging you to live your life as a disciple of Jesus

Ecclesiastes

Are You Exhausted?

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Are you exhausted? Everything about our modern culture seems to drive us to unattainable goals at unsustainable speeds. The 24/7 news cycle, social media, job and familial expectations, all keep us hurtling through time with little chance of stopping to figure out where it is we’re going. Today, exhaustion is both normal and a badge of honor. If you aren’t exhausted, you must be doing something wrong or missing out.

Of course, exhaustion is nothing new. Jesus was so worn out from doing the work of His Father that He was sleeping through a terrifying storm while reclining in a boat. (Mark 4:37–38) The disciples were so tired they couldn’t stay awake to pray with Jesus just hours before His execution. (Matthew 26:40–43) There are legitimate reasons for exhaustion, and then there is the inexcusable cause of indifference.

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Does It Break Your Heart?

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Does it break your heart to sin, or are you able to move on with little thought or remorse every time you stumble? Sin is no small thing, and to treat it as such is to treat the word and character of God with contempt. (Numbers 15:30–31; Romans 2:4) God is holy, and when He created us in His image, He created us as holy. (Genesis 1:27; Ecclesiastes 7:29) For a brief moment in time, humanity knew what it was to be sinless. In that state, God called us very good. (Genesis 1:31)

We were perfection in His eyes, and every day man and woman would walk in the garden with God. (Genesis 3:8) Our minds cannot even fathom such wonder, such beauty, and such glory. (1 Corinthians 2:9) Sin changed everything. (Romans 5:12) One sin was so egregious to God that He could not overlook it. (Genesis 2:17; Habakkuk 1:13) It is the same every time we indulge in our rebellion against our Creator. (Isaiah 53:6)

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Made for This

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Brothers and sisters, we were made for this: to live every moment of our lives for the glory of Christ and no one else. (1 Corinthians 10:31; Colossians 3:17) We do not live for the praise of men or for any self-satisfaction. (Galatians 1:10; John 5:44) God created us in His image (Genesis 1:27) and it is our duty to spend every ounce of life in this world learning to look like Him. (Romans 8:29; Ephesians 5:1)

You will never live the life God intends for you until you stop pursuing your desires and ambitions. (Luke 9:23) You will never understand God’s will for you until you stop making it about yourself. (Proverbs 3:5–6) God made you to love Him, serve Him, and share His gospel with everyone you meet. (Matthew 22:37–39; Matthew 28:19–20) That should be the sum of any life surrendered to Christ.

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Perfect Holiness

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A hard truth is that you can devote your entire life to pursuing Christ and still never master living in complete holiness. We can draw closer to Christ, but will never be with Him until we die. Thus, we will never realize our ultimate goal in this life, no matter how hard we try or how much we persist.

Everything else in life is possible except for living in perfect holiness. And yet, this is what we are called to in this life (1 Peter 1:15–16; Matthew 5:48). The goal is to try every day to be a little more like Jesus than the day before. It is the only goal worth having and pursuing. Do you believe that? If so, does your life reflect that belief?

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Don’t Just Listen

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We live in an age of incredible blessing. There are so many resources at our fingertips with which to study God’s Word. There are books, videos, websites, audio programs, and a plethora of churches where we can find God’s Word taught and expounded. Each of us could fill our days watching and hearing God’s Word preached and never run out of programming.

Woman clutching her Bible determined to have the focus and disipline to not just listen to the Word of God but to live out the commitment to obey it in discipleship to Christ through prayer and Bible study

Every one of us has the potential to know God in a deep and rewarding way. But don’t just listen to solid teaching. If you do that, you will go away not much different than you are today. The Word of God should not be background noise, something that plays throughout the day without ever penetrating any further than our ears (Ezekiel 33:31-32; Matthew 13:13-14). How dare we glance at the very Word of God with such casualness?

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