Spiritual Assessment

Tuesday, July 26

Spiritual Assessment     

I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:14

As with any race, Paul ran to win a prize. In Philippians 3, Paul is showing the place of effort in the life of a disciple who has given up trying to be saved by his own works. Rather than give up following God altogether, grace has motivated Paul to forget what is behind, and strain toward what is ahead – press on (Phil 3:13).

It seems to me that we sometimes press on to reach a good and desirable goal but do it with our own common sense understanding and then wonder why we fail to reach the target. We have a good teacher who tells us how to succeed but we sometimes still think we know better. Those well-known verses in Proverbs 3:5-7 tell us that we shouldn’t lean on our own understanding, and I guess that’s exactly what we are most inclined to do.

There is a prize for each of God’s children to be received at the dawn of the New Heavens and the New Earth. Until that day comes…press on!