Tag: Awaken From Spiritual Slumber

³ Then when Judas, His betrayer, saw that Jesus was condemned, he changed his mind and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders, ⁴ saying, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.” They said, “What is that to us? See to it yourself.” Matthew 27:3-4^ESV

The Scripture states that when Judas saw that Jesus was condemned, he changed his mind. It sounds to me that that was not his initial intention. It seems like Judas was trying to force Jesus’ hand. He wanted to see the kingdom restored to Israel and wanted it now. He didn’t want, nor did he expect it to be, a spiritual kingdom. Judas was expecting a physical kingdom that he could see and touch now. He was expecting Jesus to be the anointed king that would free Israel from the tyranny of their Roman oppressors.

Remember, they had just had the Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem. Everyone was singing and rejoicing. This seemed like the perfect time to force his will upon Jesus. Force Him to take the throne. But it was not God’s timing. It may have seemed like the perfect timing, but it wasn’t God’s timing, and that makes all the difference. We have to be extremely cognizant of God’s timing, or we will miss the boat completely, and someone else will take our place.

Judas was so focused on His own idea of what Jesus was supposed to be that he missed out completely on who Jesus was. He was in church every Sunday, best friends with the lead pastor; he even preached some Wednesday nights, and yet he had no spiritual discernment. On the outside, Judas was the epidemy of Christianity, but on the inside, he was spiritually dead. He was just going through the motions. He had no relationship with God. This why Jesus says,

“²¹ Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. ²² On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ ²³ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’”

Matthew 7:21-23

See, it’s not about the amount of good you do. It’s not about how many times you go to church a month. It’s not about how close you are with the pastor. It’s not even about how much time you spend in your Bible; it’s all about your relationship with God and our obedience to Him. It doesn’t matter if we say we love God or not; it’s how we live our lives. Judas was best friends with Jesus, he ‘loved’ Jesus, but he didn’t live his life as if he did. He only honored God with his lips.

¹³ And the Lord said: “Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me,”

Isaiah 29:13a

We have to seek the will of God. We have to seek Him to know Him. We can’t allow ourselves to fall asleep spiritually so that we can know the will of the one who created us.

Heavenly Father awaken the sleeping spirit within us today. Open our blind eyes and our deaf ears. Set a fire in our soul for You, oh LORD. Fill us with a desire to seek Your presence and Your will. Open our eyes that we may see You for who You are so that we may see Your plan for our lives. Help us to follow the path that You have paved out for us. Guide us with Your Holy Spirit. In Jesus’ name, I pray, amen.

Back to Spiritual Slumber?

Back to Daily Bread?

Similar Content

“²² But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” ~ James 1:22

Sometimes we get caught up in ourselves. We treat the Bible as a book we read but don’t really follow. We know the Scriptures, but we don’t put them into practice. We know the commands of Jesus, yet we shy away from them. We set up our own rules, justifying them with Scriptures taken out of context. We go to church every Sunday, but we don’t really take in the message. We want things sugarcoated and easy to swallow, but that’s just not Christianity.

Christianity is an action-faith. You can’t just say you’re a Christian and live however you want, cherry-picking your way through the Bible. Being a Christian takes restraint from certain things, faith, love, and imitating Jesus. But many of us have fallen asleep, and we don’t even know it. We have an appearance of Godliness, but it doesn’t go any deeper than that. Be doers of the Word, not only hearers. Don’t be deceived, allowing yourself to drift off into Spiritual Slumber. Awaken. Rid yourself of all of life’s sleeping pills.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Be Doers of The Word.

Back to Spiritual Slumber?

Back to Daily Bread?

Similar Content

“When Lot still hesitated, the angels seized his hand and the hands of his wife and two daughters and rushed them to safety outside the city, for the Lord was merciful.” ~ Genesis 19:16^NLT

Sometimes God gives us a little push so that we may be saved from ourselves. Lot chose the land of Sodom, even though it had a bad reputation. He chose men for his daughters in the land of Sodom, even though the men of Sodom were wicked. Lot looked at what he could gain, not what his soul could lose. Sometimes we look at everything we could have instead of looking at everything we could lose.

How many sought after the glamorous life of Hollywood started out as Christians and now are on drugs, completely far away from God, living in sexual immorality, and have become so blinded that they can’t even see that. Or how many sought after a glamorous job but became filled with lust for more and more power. More and more money. So much so that they spiritually corrupted themselves.

Sometimes God places blockades in our path because that’s not the path for us. Because He knows we’re meant for so much more. Because He knows what we’ll lose. It’s his way of grabbing us by the hand and rushing us to safety. But we don’t always take His hand and go, sometimes we jerk away, and we stay, as Lot’s sons-in-law did. And in the end, we are Spiritually destroyed. Awaken and look around. Is this what God has in store for you? Is this good for your Spirit? Don’t be deceived by beauty because Sodom was beautiful and seemed to flourish on the outside, but on the inside, it was wicked and spiritually dead.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Pay Attention To The Blockades.

Back to Spiritual Slumber?

Back to Daily Bread?

Similar Content

“⁸ She saw that for all the adulteries of that faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away with a decree of divorce. Yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but she too went and played the whore. ⁹ Because she took her whoredom lightly, she polluted the land, committing adultery with stone and tree. ¹⁰ Yet for all this, her treacherous sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but in pretense, declares the Lord.” ~ Jeremiah 3:8-10

The LORD is speaking of the nations of Israel and Judah. He separated Himself from Israel after she worshiped other gods, placing up high-places for them and worshiping there. Once Judah saw what happened to Israel, the LORD expected Judah to learn from Israel’s mistakes, but they didn’t. Judah sinned, in the same way Israel did. When Israel was separated from the LORD, He expected them to repent, but they didn’t. They continued in their idolatry.

Sometimes we are like Israel. We are drawn away by other gods; while God is waiting for us to return, we continue in our sins and ignore the lack of His voice. The lack of His presence. The lack of Him. Yet the longer we stay in idolatry, the less we care. The more we fall spiritually asleep. We care less and less what is right and what is wrong, just what feels good, what feels right. What satisfies our desires until we are no longer asleep but spiritually dead.

And sometimes, we are like Judah. We see others go down a dangerous road. We see the repercussions. The hardships. The emptiness. Sometimes, we even witness their own death, yet we still follow in their footsteps. We still seek after the same things. We still walk away from God, who is life and gives life, to false gods, who are death and bring death. Somehow we don’t seem to learn from the mistakes of those before us because we believe we’ll be the one to get away with it. We don’t even realize that with every step we take away from God, we take towards our spiritual death.

Don’t be like Israel or Judah. Don’t seek pleasure in unrighteous acts or follow in weak footsteps. Look to God for everything, and He will provide it. He will answer you when you call. You will find Him when you seek Him with your whole heart. Don’t do as Judah did when they sought the LORD. They simply looked for a way to escape their judgment, not for a relationship. Not for repentance. But with a false mask of humility and remorse so that they could escape judgment without having to change.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Seek With Your Whole Heart.

Back to Spiritual Slumber?

Back to Daily Bread?

Similar Content

“Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain is a righteous man who gives way before the wicked.” ~ Proverbs 25:26

Often times, we as Christians will give in to the pressures of the world and allow sin to be prominent in our nation. When we do that, we become like a muddy spring or a polluted fountain. In other words, we are Spiritually Asleep. We stop working the way the Holy Spirit recreated us to. When we fall spiritually asleep our soul becomes at risk for spiritual death.

We begin to make excuses for sin because we don’t want to offend anyone or “force our faith on others.” We want to be liked by all, but Jesus told us something fundamental, “if you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” We are not of the world, so why do we destroy our righteousness to become accepted by the world? Is it really worth it to become like stagnant water before the LORD?

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Be Like Running Water.

Back to Spiritual Slumber?

Back to Daily Bread?

Similar Content