The Daily Word of Righteousness

A Giant Step Forward, #7

You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand. (Psalms 16:11)

How we live. Mankind was created to play, that is, to be always delighting in the will of God. We cannot play righteously and joyfully while we are bound with any of the three branches of sin. We are never free to play until our will is identical with God's will.

The difference between work and play has nothing to do with an expenditure of energy. Playing is doing what we want to do. Working is doing what we do not want to do. Adam and Eve were able to play in the Garden of Eden until they sinned. Then they were driven from Paradise and forced to work.

"Man shall not live by bread alone," the Lord quoted to Satan, "but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God."

To live by bread alone is to think, speak, and act according to human talents, wisdom, and energy.

To live by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God is to abide in Christ to such an extent we are looking to the Lord for every decision we make.

Words are always coming from the mouth of God. Some of them are being directed toward each creature, situation, and thing in the universe, from the ants on the ground to the galaxies in outer space. We always are to be listening and looking for the Word of God to us for the moment. To do so is to be living in Christ, in the rest of God.

The Lord Jesus spoke nothing, did nothing, and thought nothing, except that which was coming to Him from the Father. We are to live in precisely the same manner.

Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. (John 6:57)

Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. (I John 2:6)

Each day we make numerous decisions, most of them very minor and some of them of more apparent importance. We have a choice at each point of decision: we can look to Jesus for wisdom and strength, or we can proceed according to our own impulses, wisdom, and experience.

In the Book of Proverbs we are commanded to trust in the Lord with all our heart and to not lean on our own understanding. We are to acknowledge the Lord in all our ways, not in some of our ways but in all of our ways. He then promises to direct our paths, to make them straight.

This is how the Lord Jesus always lives, and we are to live exactly as He does.

To be continued.