Run for all You’re Worth!
“Faster! Faster! Run for all you’re worth.”
Perhaps you recall an incident in your life when your legs carried you faster than you ever dreamed you could run. The occasion wasn’t a race at a picnic or a school competition. Your legs may have moved quickly to win a chocolate bar at a summer race but that sure wasn’t your fastest.
Remember the time when you almost became airborne? The reality was – you were scared and you were running for all you were worth to get out of harm’s way. That’s the picture the Apostle Paul painted for Timothy in one of his letters to him.
But as for you, O man of God,
flee these things.
Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness.
(1Timothy 6:11)
“Timothy, other people with great potential for the Lord have fallen in love with money and materialism and have gotten so far off track and so far away that their lives have been utterly consumed and destroyed. It’s nothing less than a tragedy. The world looks at them and sees prosperity, pleasure and success. The world craves to have what they have. But the Lord looks at the very same person and sees them lying in the dust of earth, writhing and twisting in the fetal position, having been severely wounded.” (Verse 9-10)
“But Timothy, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t let it happen to you. Flee for your life. Run as fast as your legs can carry you in the opposite direction – away from the temptation that has the potential to wreck your life. If you have been looking with longing eyes at all those nice things and how much you would enjoy having lots of silver and gold, do a 180 turn immediately. Turn your back on those things. Run away from the temptations and run towards, as if you are chasing just as feverishly, the qualities of righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness and gentleness.”
As you read this, do you also need to turn around today and kick up dust running in an opposite direction? Have you been courting sin or flirting with disaster? Is there something you have been occupied with lately that could consume more and more of your life and leave less and less for the Lord? Run from it.
Is there someone you have been flirting with who could bring disaster into your Christian life? Flee today. Is there an idea, a concept or a dream upon which you are fixated that will bring you down if you go after it? Will the Lord eventually see you lying in the dust of earth twisting and curling in the fetal position, mortally wounded?
Flee; run with urgency from that thing. Let it go. Drop it even if it breaks your heart. Better to have your heart broken than your life broken.
Focus on righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness and gentleness. Focus on Christ. It’s time to get back on track – today.
Walk carefully and closely with the Lord today.
Warmly in Christ
Peter Ramsay