Fumbling in the light

I have been a Christian for a long time, and yet, I still feel like I'm just getting started, still trying to figure things out, still fumbling in the light.

It's frustrating to have read the bible through hundreds of times, and still have things I need to work on. I guess I am really frustrated with the reality of my ever active, ever present sin nature, how desperately wicked I am, and how fallen we all are. It's such a bother to have to deal with this sin nature. For me, the best part of heaven will be the absense of my sin nature. Oh sure, I will love the new body, and the new home and eternity, but to be rid of this sin nature....I cannot wait!

I read the word, pray and gradually grow, rowing toward the goal....and yet the me I started with is still active, still busy, still trying to get his own way. For all of us it's the weight we long to unload, the anchor that slows our progress.

I vividly remember the comments from one of our men in the church when we had to announce the fall of a friend. He came up to me with tears, and wept, "I hate sin, I hate sin...." He couldn't say anything else. Well, that describes it for me. That's the place I have come to- a deep hatred for sin and what it does, and in the shadow of that I am also working on another thing, quite the opposite...

I'm comsumed by Jesus' simple instructions to a religion leader who asked, "what's the most important thing?" Jesus replied, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

I am teaching on this tomorrow, but it has become more than a simple topic to teach through, it is weaving its golden threads through all that I am. I can't wait to see what these words do in my life, for they are becoming most important to me.

I am convinced of this one thing- If I work on nothing else in my entire Christian life other than these two things-to love God and love my neighbor, I will have a great walk with God!