"Then he said to them all: 'If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.'" Luke 9:23

As followers of Jesus, we are called to daily make the decision to surrender our lives to Christ. I want to be a follower that wakes up each morning and before I get out of bed, chooses life. I choose Christ. Right then and there, I take my life and lay it down before him, I deny myself and carry my cross to follow him. This can only be done a day at a time. I cannot live out tomorrow, today. Nor can I live yesterday again. I must live one day at a time, and this is no easy feat. It is hard to lay down our lives, if it was easy, it wouldn't be such a sacrifice. But the love and sacrifice of Christ demands a response, and this is what he asks of us,

"For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it."
Luke 9:24

I cannot do this on my on strength! It is only in Christ that I am able to live each day for Him and not myself, and "to offer my body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God - which is my spiritual act of worship." (Romans 12:1) And it is a daily act of worship, started a new each day. C.S. Lewis said,

"The thing is to rely only on God. The time will come when you will regard all this misery as a small price to pay for having been brought to that dependence. Meanwhile, the trouble is that relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing has yet been done."

AMEN! We start over each day, or at least, that is how it need to be when we are living by God's grace and strength. Boy do I need to learn to live day by day. My mom says I project(in to the future that is) way too much. She's right. I tend to try and live months ahead of time, and if I analyzed it enough I would probably realize that it's because I don't want to rest where I'm at and wait on the Lord. It probably because I am not living each day as a choice to deny myself and follow him, I am looking toward a big picture that I created. How ridiculous does that sound? "A big picture that I created." Who the heck am I to be creating anything, especially ideas and plans for the future; that belongs to God and Him alone. I tend to plan and then ask Him about it, instead of quieting myself before Him and waiting patiently and silently for His whisper. I love what Brennan Manning says here, every time I read it I literally laugh out loud because I think this is me sometimes,


"Deciding what I most need out of life, carefully calculating my next move, and generally allowing my autonomous self to run amuck inflates my sense of self-importance and reduces the God of my incredible journey to the role of spectator on the sidelines. It is only the wisdom and perspective gleaned from an hour of silent prayer each morning that prevents me from running for CEO of the universe."

So I think this is where I am in life. Learning... to be still and know that He is God. To wait patiently for him to reveal himself to me. To seek His will for my life, rather than planning one out on my own and then asking him about it. To accept His timing, not my own. To open my heart to His call, and to listen for His voice, that often comes in a soft whisper.