A Life Lived for God, Part I

Lately, I have been examining myself and realizing how short my short-comings actually are. Some people would probably say that I am being to hard on myself. But, I would simply respond to them that they just don't see the depths of my soul. I remember reading recently a pithy quote that, I think, captures the gravity of man's sin. It went something like this: A woman approached the pastor of a local congregation and began complementing the pastor for his godly, upstanding demeanor and behavior. He looked at her and said very simply, "If you could see the depths of my soul, you would probably like to spit in my face." It seems to me that there is something to this story. Anytime we begin to think too highly of ourselves, sin will be lurking nearby waiting for us to take our guard down.

So, in order to combat this in myself, I will be writing a series on (as the above title indicates) a life lived for God. Paul states in Romans 12:1-2 what a life for God looks like. He writes, "I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." Paul is clear; God desires our whole lives, and nothing less should be expected, which is only reasonable seeing how Christ gave his whole life for us. The question then is what does that look like. What exactly characterizes a living sacrifice? It seems to me that Paul includes a list elsewhere that defines what a life lived for God would be characterized by. He writes in Galatians 5:22-23, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law." It is the fruit of the Spirit that must characterize the life lived for God. So that is what this series of posts will be about. Each post will explain how each fruit leads to becoming a living sacrifice. Now, you may be thinking to yourselves, "That is not really that difficult." My question for you (and in reality for me also) then is, do each of things truly typify your life in the eyes of others and of God? Do you have actual peace all the time? Are you enduringly patience and longsuffering? Are you a joyful person? Are you completely faithful to God and others? Are you gentle when wronged? Honestly, I would have to answer a resounding "no" each question. So, this is my attempt to understand what it means to live a life for God.