Day 77 – God as Center
In finding true spiritual freedom, Brother Lawrence calls us to confront all lesser loves in order to “love God above all things.”
Picture an old wagon wheel with God as the center and all other loves as the spokes.
Think of all the people and things you love – friends, activities, food, projects, hobbies, sports. Where is God in relation to all these?
Can you say: “I love God above all things! I want to know him above all things! My God is at the center of all my loves!”
One requirement of my undergrad experience at Bible college was an internship. Between my junior and senior years, I interned for a summer at a church in Alberta, Canada.
Among other learning experiences, I was given the opportunity to be the speaker for a junior high weekend retreat. I worked really hard for 3-4 weeks in preparing that series of talks. Detailed notes, helpful diagrams, illustrative pictures, interactive questions, colorful stories, youth workbooks.
My theme was about balanced Christian living – balancing the spiritual, mental, emotional, social, and physical dimensions of life.
The following Sunday the youth gave a report to the congregation, and one girl summarized the whole weekend in one sentence better than I did in three days! She said, “When you put Christ at the center of your life, everything else comes into balance.”
You can center your life around your job, your career, your family, your education. You can center your life around making money or clothes or a sport or a hobby. None of these are wrong in themselves. They just don’t belong at the center.
If any of these are at the center of your life, then you won’t have enough glue to hold yourself together. Life will unravel. You need a stronger center.
As an act of your will, place Christ at your center. Pray often affirming, “Jesus, be the center of my life.”
Then live your life from that center where Christ dwells within you with all the radiating spokes in your wagon wheel of life kept in balance.
You will discover Matthew 6:33 to be true: “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”
Action Step: Draw a wagon wheel of what’s important to you and place Christ at the center.
This is God’s Word for you today,
Pastor Dave
