Listen to God.

Being a Christian has a lot to do with growth. From the time we are baptized into Christ and become babes, we have a responsibility to grow spiritually. Over time, we become stronger and more sure in our faith. Through diligent study, we begin to see the things which God would have us to do. Because we love Him and want to please Him, we strive to make those changes.

However, one thing that I see a lot that many have a hard time overcoming is selfishness. Many grow in knowledge, but so many do not grow emotionally.

Now, it’s not necessarily that we refuse to think of others and to help them. That’s not the kind of selfishness I’m referring to. I’m talking about the selfishness that occurs when we decide that we would much rather ignore what God would have us to do and pretend it doesn’t exist.

Don’t so many of us do that? There are so many things that we as people want to continue to do, yet, as human beings we have a hard time giving those things up!

The apostle Paul talks about this in Romans chapter 7. He says: “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but the very thing I hate. Now, if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that is good.” (15-16)

He is saying that there are many things as a Christian, let’s face it-we don’t really like to do. However, whether or not we ‘like’ it has nothing to do with it. When we love God, and are striving to live the way He would have us live, we are going to do that which we don’t like to do. Being a Christian takes sacrifice. 

Sure, we might not like having to give things up that we enjoy doing, but Jesus gave up everything for us on the cross-which is so much more than our pet sins we enjoy taking part in.

Romans 12:2 says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, acceptable and perfect.”

Being a Christian means to radically change your thinking and way of doing things. In a movie I watched once called, “To Save A Life”, a young man who has started attending a church became angry with some of the people in the youth group. They were whispering and ignoring what a person speaking had to say about the bible. In frustration, he stood up and exclaimed, “If you’re not going to let it change you, why are you even here?”

Ask yourselves that. If you’re not allowing God to change you inside and out, why even call yourself a Christian? Why even attend worship? As it says in Romans 12:2, and various other places, we must be transformed. We can’t continue doing the same things we were doing before. We’re not going to be perfect, but we can’t allow our lives to be ruled by the same principles or lack thereof that we lived by before.

The only way Christians are going to make an impact in our world is if we start removing the selfishness in our hearts and allow God to rule in us-and to actually LISTEN to Him. When we allow God to move us, the world is going to hear us-loud and clear.