Day 20: That's My King

I loved Danette’s devotion this morning & Tadd’s blog post last night. This fast has been a time of wrestling & struggling for me. My hope is that even though my emotions through this haven’t always been pretty, that this quote from Tadd will be true…

God takes our imperfect attitudes, our imperfect words, our imperfect actions, and when mixed with faith makes them a sweet smelling aroma to himself.

One of the things I’ve wrestled with these past few days is a desire to please people. There’s some empty place inside of me that I want to fill with people’s approval. I wish it weren’t there, but it is and it shows it’s ugly self way too often.

As I thought about that, in light of this weekend, I was so humbled. Throughout Jesus’ life there was never a shortage of people that didn’t approve of Him. Leading up to His death, He was mocked, beat, ridiculed, and then, on this Good Friday, our innocent Jesus was killed, next to thieves with a shameful death on a cross.

If Jesus had his eyes on the world & wanted their approval He could have stopped the madness at any moment & done whatever He wanted to prove himself to be the King, the one most worthy of our love. But He didn’t. He had an audience of one. He was solely focused on God…His plan, His will, His purposes.

Thanks to His obedience to God’s will, He died for our sins & rose from the dead. He changed the world forevermore. He became the remedy for all that’s wrong in this world…starvation, death, disease, sin, pain…all of it. He became the sacrifice that paved the way for me & you to be adopted as God’s children.

May He impart that kind of singular focus to us today & let us watch in anticipation to see what God will do! Think on this…

Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ. Galatians 1:10

Let’s lay down our desire for approval, forget what anyone might think, & run with reckless abandonment after God & His will. Let us throw fear aside & invite people to join us at church this weekend. Let’s pray with passion that God will bring record numbers of people to hear the truth of who Jesus is & that He will prepare their hearts to receive Jesus as their King!

He is the one who will fill our empty places & He is the one deserving of every ounce of our focus. That’s my King…let’s sacrifice everything to serve Him.


Jen