Daily Devotional For Wednesday, February 5, 2025

Well, we all have made it to Wonderful Wednesday, also known as “Hump Day.” You are halfway through this week. Can you believe it? Time is flying. I have a question for us today to jump start this devotional – what expectations do you have about your relationship to Jesus Christ and what are you doing to reach them? For many Christians, they have very low expectations for their relationship to Christ because they see it not so much as a relationship, but as a ritual. They see it as things they do rather than the person they are becoming. There is a huge difference in these two.

Therefore, for many Christians, they are willing to give God about an hour or slightly more on Sundays. For them, God is a hobby. He is not their Lord. One of my expectations for my relationship to Jesus Christ for 2025 is to make Jesus THE priority in my life. I do not want to see HIm as an “add-on” to an already busy and crammed life and schedule. Why? I want Him to be the foundation I build everything in my life on for His glory. I want to be a God-centered person so that I build my life on Him. I want to do in 2025 what Jesus says in Matthew 6:33, “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (NASB).

I never want to cheapen our Lord’s sacrifice by reducing worship to fellowship, learning from each other and helping each other. Worship never focuses on us; it focuses only on God, by remembering Who He is and what He has done for us through Jesus Christ. Worship and our lives should be preoccupation with God. I want 2025 to really be WWJD? 

For many years, leaders of the American Church have been guilty of setting very low spiritual expectations. We—and I mean the American Church in general—has been led to believe that it was enough if we attended church while wearing the right clothes and sitting, standing, and singing at the right times. If we could pull off a semblance of godliness inside the building and not engage in blatant sin outside the building, we were good. But that is a tragic presentation of the faith our God expects of us. 

It is incomplete to the point that it is dishonest and destructive. It is highly likely that, if that is the only message we ever hear, we will miss the Kingdom of God entirely. Instead, we’re called to surrender ourselves—body, soul, and spirit—to the Lord. We’re called to live as sincere followers of God whose greatest desires are to know Him, love Him, serve Him, and sacrifice our old nature in order to become more like Him every day. So, if your character is not more like Jesus Christ from a year ago, God is just a hobby to you. He is an “add-on,” and not a build-on. 

Jesus had expectations of Himself. One is found in Luke 19:10, “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost” (NASB). He did that. Most people I know like for things to stay the way they are. They do not like change. As Mark Twain once said, “The only one who likes change is a wet baby.” Change comes from expectations. Even though many people, including some Christians, might say, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!” or “Leave well enough alone” or “I don’t like surprises” or “Stay with the sure thing,” this may work with some things, but not our relationship to Christ. Why? We are broken and need fixing. We are not well enough alone. Our current relationship to Christ is not the sure thing.

We admire pioneers, those fearless people who dare go do what we are afraid to do. Who are willing to risk change for something better. We love them as long as what they do does not cost us anything or bring about some kind of unwanted change in our own lives. We are creatures of both habit and the familiar. Unfortunately, that habit and familiarity can be the same old stale and stagnant relationship to Christ. 

In order to grow spiritually, we have to get out of our comfort zone and take a risk with God. Even our heroes of faith had to do this to rise up to God’s expectations of them. For example:

• Noah – God had expectations for him. Can you imagine the mockery from everyone as he was building an Ark? The jokes? The ridicule? Noah lived up to God’s expectations and the world got a reboot and a restart.
•  Abraham had to leave the familiarity of the “land of the Chaldeans” to become the “father of a great nation” at the age of 75. Abraham then had to trust God to give him a son named Isaac. For all Sarah’s life (his wife) and his marriage life to her, they had been childless. It is clear they had expectations of wanting children, but think of how their expectations had to change being 100 (Abraham) and 90 (Sarah) when Isaac was born. Together they raise their only biological son and then God asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. Abraham didn’t see that expectation from God coming but he was willing to live up to God’s expectations if God demanded.
• Moses grew up as a “prince of Egypt” so to speak. After killing an Egyptian, he fled Egypt. For 40 years he wandered in the wilderness. He eventually takes a wife during this time and then at the age of 80, God revealed to him His expectations of Moses. It took some convincing to get Moses to get out what was his comfort zone and what was familiar to him, but he eventually got there. 
• David was just a young teen and a shepherd boy. He was familiar with sheep, predators and a sling. He took Goliath’s challenge and fulfilled God’s expectations of him and in time, he went to be king of Israel, shepherding God’s people. 
• The Apostle Paul – he thought God had expectations for him to eradicate and exterminate Christianity from Judaism. But once he learned God’s expectations for his life to be an apostle to the Gentiles and the Jews, he lived up to that. 

Everyone in Scripture who chose to follow God had to accept change and move past what was familiar. That is called faith and without it, we cannot please God (Heb. 11:6). God does love you, but He loves you too much to leave you the way you are. Do you love Him enough to cooperate with Him to change into the person He expects you to become? I hope so.

Questions To Consider

1. What expectations do you have of your relationship to Jesus Christ and why?
2. What expectations do you think God has of your relationship to Jesus Christ and why?
3. Is God a hobby for you or a way of life for you? Why?
4. Jesus of Nazareth completely accomplished our redemption on the cross, but it must be lived out through a lifestyle that pursues and grows our personal relationship with Him. How are you doing that now?

Scripture To Meditate On: Colossians 3:10b, “. . . put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him” (NASB).

Prayer To Pray: ”Heavenly Father, I acknowledge my new life, which Jesus purchased for me through the cross, must be lived out daily—in every choice, decision, word, and deed. Holy Spirit, help me to live in a way that honors Jesus’ sacrifice, and in a vibrant relationship with my Lord and My God. I don’t want You to be a hobby or an “add-on” to my already busy life. I want You to be the foundation I build my life on for Your glory. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”

I love you Southside!--Pastor Kelly