What Spirit Do I Live?

Good Morning,

2 Timothy 1:7 (NIV)
For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.
(I would urge everyone to take a couple of minutes and read the short chapter 2 Timothy 1)

Much too often many of us act in exactly the opposite way and with a spirit inside us that is at total odds of what Paul wrote to Timothy...and to us, I believe.

Instead of a spirit of power that comes from knowing Jesus Christ in our lives as Lord and Savior and having the Holy Spirit indwelling in us, we act with timidity and in ways that says little, if anything, about the power we can call on. We, too many of us, go about our lives like the "Casper Milquetoast" character with our heads down and speaking softly and not having our say when we disagree with what we see and hear in the world. In other words, our actions are anything BUT a showing of the power of God that we have inside if we will just call on it.

Again, in opposite of what Paul says in the short verse of Scripture, we don't really act with a spirit of love, either. I mean, if we see someone who is down, more often than not, we turn away or ignore that one instead of going forward and sharing the love of God as we ought to do. Many of us tend to avoid and even run away from those who are grieving and in need of God's love that we so easily take for granted and that He has shown toward us. That doesn't mean that we act in a hateful or hurtful manner, it's just that too many times we just don't act in a loving manner.

Need I even mention self discipline here? Do we show the world that we are different by living our lives with a true spirit of self discipline? Or, do we go about like almost everyone of the world and just do as they do without regard to disciplining ourselves in almost any manner? We consume as the world consumes. (If you doubt that, I would challenge you to look at all of the unnecessary things you might have sitting around your home and that which is in your clothes closet.) If we're hones when we take a bit of an inventory, we'll admit to ourselves that yes, we have acted in the exact opposite of what would be true should we have acted with self discipline. And, of course, it's not only in this area of our lives that we act with little or no self discipline. We eat too much...and too richly...and too expensively. Some of us drink too much...and too richly...and too expensively. We entertain ourselves way too much...and too richly...and too expensively. And, well, as we know "the list goes on."

How can those of the world know that we are different; know that we are believers in a risen Lord; know that we are Christians? How can they know if we don't show a true spirit of power, of love, and of self discipline in our lives? To take it one step further, why would they even want to know about Jesus Christ if all they see of Christians is much like what they see in everyone else?

Bottom line here is that we need to look at how we go about our daily activities and if we're not particularly thrilled by what we see, then we need to see about making some changes.

God gives us His Holy Spirit to indwell us and provide us with our own spirit of exactly what we read in today's Scripture.

We need to take advantage of it and live accordingly.

Love, peace, and blessings,

David