Daily Devotional

Word of the Day

Coming Off Your Throne

Paul said in I Corinthians 15, "I die daily." Do you? So many people saw the movie, "The Passion." The effect that the visual has on people is really amazing. How many people have been told the story of the crucifixion in Sunday school and church over the years? Then they saw one of the most realistic renditions of what Jesus endured as the sin-bearer, the gift of God to humanity. Many were moved and horrified at the violence, the cruelty, and the cost for the forgiveness of their sins! Yet the movie didn't even come close to representing the torment. The Scripture says He was so beaten, so marred, and so affected by our sin that He couldn't even be recognized as a man! (Isa. 52:14) He was a mutilated mass of flesh! That's what it means to be crucified, and that is supposed to happen to you every day. What are you experiencing? As I am crucified with Christ on a daily basis, my death is that ugly, that violent, and that real. How did your cross go today?

"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and [died] for me," Paul said in Galatians. Crucifixion is coming off your throne--the throne of self-will, self-reliance, self-righteousness, the idolatry of secular humanism, the worship of the creature more than the Creator--and climbing onto a cross. Our churches are full of the doctrine of self helps, twelve-step programs, improving our self-image and self-worth. Biblical Christianity isn't recognizable in most churches today because there's no talk about death to self! It's the honor of self. It's the glorification of self. It's the promotion of self.

Tragically we promote self in the guise of serving Jesus. We battle for positions in the eyes of those in the community. We want to serve in this area where we can be seen. We want our works appreciated. We wonder why this person receives preferential treatment over us and why do our good gifts get overlooked. It goes on without end to the degree that there are people in our churches. How do we measure up? "Well, praise God, we're better than those guys down the street." Are we? I don't see anywhere in the Scripture where we're supposed to compare ourselves with the people down the street. There's only one standard, and it's perfection. There's only one prototype: Jesus. There's only One Who we can compare ourselves with, and that's the gift of God.

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