In conversation recently a Scripture came up that reminded me anew about the necessity and vitalness on my part to be actively and fervently pursuing the will of God for my life:<\/p>\n
Philippians 3:12 Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after<\/strong>, if that I may apprehend<\/strong> that for which also I am apprehended by Christ Jesus.\u00a0 (KJV, bold emphasis mine)<\/p>\n Though God made the first move towards me, and apprehended my life and made me His own, the ball is now in my<\/strong> court to passionately and devotedly apprehend all that He has for me to receive and to accomplish during my pilgrimage on this earth.\u00a0 Verses 13-14 (once again, bold emphasis mine) go on to say:<\/p>\n Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this<\/em> one thing I do<\/em>, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth<\/strong> to those things which are before, I remember seeing an advertisement years ago that compelled me to write its content on one of the back flaps of my Bible so that I could periodically be reminded of the type of posture and attitude that God does not<\/strong> want me to have!\u00a0 The ad was for some kind of drink to aid in the losing of weight and it touted this tempting slogan for the would-be dieter:<\/p>\n \u0093NO WORK OR LIFESTYLE CHANGE REQUIRED!\u0094<\/p>\n That\u0092s ludicrous! But, sadly, isn\u0092t that what a lot of us as Christians want?\u00a0 We want to experience the presence of God; receive the promises and blessings of the Lord; have changes that will produce Christ-likeness in us, but we want all of these things to happen with minimal effort (or better yet no<\/strong> effort) on our part! We just want to go about as we\u0092ve been doing \u0096 God forbid we\u0092d have to change our lifestyle! I\u0092m not talking about getting caught up in dead works, or busyness without fruitfulness but a true fervent spirit that follows hard after the Lord with whole-hearted dedication, devotion, commitment and consecration.\u00a0 Apprehending with such determined purpose that we will let no one and no thing get in the way of or hamper our pursuit!\u00a0 The rewards, blessings, fulfillment and satisfaction of such an all-out\/sold-out pursuit are beyond description!\u00a0<\/p>\n I encourage you to take a quiet moment before the Lord and allow for a long, hard look to examine the manner and the premium you have put on \u0093apprehending that for which I am also apprehended by Christ Jesus\u0094.\u00a0 Remember this:<\/p>\n If you are looking for excuses you will find them. You have been apprehended, chosen, and called, and have come into the Kingdom for such a time as this.\u00a0 \u0093Be fervent in spirit, serving the Lord\u0094!\u00a0 (Romans 12:11)\u00a0 The word \u0093fervent\u0094 is one of my favorite Greek words in the whole Bible.\u00a0 It\u0092s the word \u0093zeo\u0094 (dzeh-o) and it means: to be hot, to the boiling of liquids and the glowing of solids.\u00a0 Now that\u0092s hot! <\/strong>\u00a0And that<\/strong> is the type of posture and attitude that God expects and desires from us.\u00a0 When I read that phrase I can see that the first statement is interchangeable with the second \u0096 to be fervent in spirit is <\/strong>to be serving the Lord; to be serving the Lord is <\/strong>to be fervent in spirit! To think we can have one without the other is to only be fooling ourselves, and only amounts to presenting to the world a diluted, compromised, impotent form of Christianity that they will not be interested in having!\u00a0<\/p>\n Be encouraged and compelled to follow hard after Him, to follow on to know the Lord, to follow the Lamb wherever He goes, to seek Him with your whole heart.\u00a0 You will find that the workmanship of God that takes place in your life will have been so worth the effort, and that the godly lifestyle changes wrought in you will cause you to be \u0093sought out\u0094 by those watching and observing your manner and standard of living!\u00a0 Be counted among those who want to apprehend the Lord.\u00a0Be not in the company of those who have settled for a complacent, apathetic walk with the Lord that requires “no work or lifestyle changes” – but with those who want ZEO!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In conversation recently a Scripture came up that reminded me anew about the necessity and vitalness on my part to be actively and fervently pursuing the will of God for my life: Philippians 3:12 Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.ekklesiaofcrane.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nI press<\/strong> towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
\nIn these three verses alone there are four words and\/or phrases that emphasize effort and activity on my part: follow after, apprehend, reaching forth, <\/em>and press.\u00a0 <\/em>The Greek definitions of these words reveals I am to be stretching myself forward; pursuing; taking eagerly, seizing and possessing all that God has made possible in so great a salvation!<\/p>\n
\n<\/em>If you are looking for God you will find no excuse!<\/em><\/p>\n