GraceCreates

By Jon Walker

By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them – yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. 1 Corinthians 15:10 (NIV)

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God wants you to be you.

You don’t have to try to pretend to be someone else; you don’t have to hide who you actually are. The most attractive people I know are not the best looking; rather, they’re authentic to who they are.

There’s no pretense about them.

You can relax knowing that being yourself is exactly what God wants of you. You bring glory to God just be being yourself because he created you to be just the person you are.

Now, believe you are who God says you are!

No one else has a vote on who you are. You’re free to be you instead of imitating someone else. You’re free to use your unique, God-given gifts and there’s no need to compare your gifts to the gifts of others.

No one else is in competition to be you!

You are God’s masterpiece, a work of his own hands.

“By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them – yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10 NIV).

Where are the places in your life where you’re still trying to be someone else? Ask God to guide you to yourself.

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2009 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

“But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’” Luke 18:13 (NIV)

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Two men: one confident he was righteous; the other confident he had sinned.

One prayed, “Thank God, I’m not like other men”; the other cried, “Oh God, I am a man who needs your mercy.”

One thinks he’s earned a hearing from God; the other knows he’s only heard by God because of heaven’s grace (Luke 18:9-15).

We are like the first man when we try to make ourselves appear more than what we are, failing to grasp that God loves us because of whose we are and not because of what we’ve done.

The light that shines within us is put within “our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6 NIV).

We sin when we try to put our own “shine” on our simple jars of clay.

We maneuver and posture to make our jars look better; we decorate the outside with ecclesiastical vain glories that we call image, power, position, or wealth.

We do this because we think our power, which is easily surpassable, somehow makes us strong when, all the while it is in our weakness  that God shows himself the strongest. His light shines through even greater when we acknowledge we are God’s jars of clay.

The glory that shines from within us is not our own; it is God’s glory and his alone. He is glorified as he re-creates his creations into blameless and pure children “without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe” (Philippians 2:15 NIV).

You, my friend, magnify the glory of God by simply being you and letting him shine through you. May God “make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you” (Numbers 6:25 NIV).

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2009 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Galatians 5:24 (NIV)

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In faith, I know this to be true:

God is developing my character and, through the Holy Spirit, he’s planted the character of Christ in me. He’s more concerned about growing Jesus-character in me than he is with my convenience or comfort, which are fleeting things at best (Galatians 5:24).

God wants me joyful for all eternity and so his objective is to complete the fullness of joy within me (John 15:11).

God initiates my growth into the character of Jesus, by freely giving me his salvation. Salvation belongs to my God (Psalm 51:12-13).

He creates within me a willing spirit, so that I can teach others about God’s compassion (Psalm 51:12-13).

The truth is Christ-character is not deposited in me through my own work; it is a gift from God; one I must accept in faith (Ephesians 2:8; Psalm 51:16).

As God grows me up in Christ, I begin to have my Father’s eyes of compassion that enlighten me “in order that [I] may know the hope to which he has called [me], the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints” (Ephesians 1:18 NIV).

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2009 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.

By Jon Walker

It is God himself who has made us what we are and given us new lives from Christ Jesus; and long ages ago he planned that we should spend these lives in helping others. Ephesians 2:10 (LB)

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 ”You may be the only picture of Jesus someone will ever see.” The commonly heard statement is true, and the work of the Holy Spirit within us is to draw that picture of Jesus out of us until people see it face-to-face.

The problem occurs when we begin to insist that everyone must look exactly the same, that Jesus-in-you should look exactly like Jesus-in-me.

God loves variety and created each of us with different shapes, interests, and personalities, yet, just as all humans have foundational features, such as a common blood system, we all reflect the same Creator.

In Jesus, we share a common blood system, the cleansing, renewing blood of Christ, but the Jesus-in-me may look different than the Jesus-in-you.

To see it another way, we are like stained glass and our different personalities reflect God’s light in a variety of colors and patterns. He shaped us so there would be no duplication, so none of us would have the exact same mix as another, making us each unique.

“It is God himself who has made us what we are and given us new lives from Christ Jesus; and long ages ago he planned that we should spend these lives in helping others (Ephesians 2:10 LB).

Each of us is a unique, one-of-a-kind, never to be repeated expression of Christ. Steve Pettit says, “There is a sacramental nature to our particular personalities and, within the family, the God-given freedom to be who we were created to be.”

With that also comes the God-given responsibility of love to look out for one another, to know and be known, to love and to be loved, and to encourage each other to reach their fullest expression of Christ-in-me.

Our objective-in-Jesus is to help each other become the best picture of Jesus we can be.

If you’d like to receive these devotionals regularly, you can sign-up at www.gracecreates.com/subscribe/. Jon Walker writes from www.gracecreates.com. He is a Zondervan author, and the former writer/editor of the Purpose Driven Life On-Line Devotionals. This devotional is copyrighted 2009 by Jon Walker. Used by permission.