January 12

Today in my devotional I read from both the old and the new testaments, Deuteronomy and Matthew. In Deuteronomy we read about the law God gave to Israel. In Matthew we read Jesus' sermon on the mount. Both pertain to God's Law. I know that we are incapable of living a life that follows all of God's laws. Rom 3:23  "for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God;". So why does God give us a law that we are incapable of following. For one it provides the opportunity for us to realize the wonderful mercy of God. My devotional reading put it like this; We use a tape measure to measure a person's height. The tape measure tells us if the person has grown or not. The tape measure however does not promote growth. So the law is for us, it is God's example of what are lives should be like. The law in itself does not promote spiritual growth, only the grace of God at work in our lives can do that. So are we to sit back and say okay God I am sitting here waiting for you to change me? No, we have to do what is commanded of us. I had a conversation about this yesterday. It can be misunderstood that what I am saying is we are to just sit and do nothing and let God do everything for us. Well it doesn't work that way. We are to do everything we can and not worry about the results, we are to leave those up to God. When Jesus was talking about the birds and how God took care of them. God did not allow them to sit in their nest and him bring them food. They had to go out, look for it and God provided for them. The same goes for us we are to go out and do everything we can and then trust in God that he will provide the results he wants.