Tuesday, December 6, 2011

How is your walk?


Do you speak "christianese?"  If you don't, let me explain that the question "How's your walk?" is shorthand for me getting all up in your "bidness."  This is the shorthand way of asking about the day to day relationship with the Lord.  It really is an appropriate way of stating the question.  Our relationship with God is not stagnant; it is going somewhere.  The Bible uses this terminology a lot.  Look at the lengthy list below:

Walk in Light
1Jn 1:6  If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 1Jn 1:7  But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.  
Eph 5:8  for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light
Joh 12:35  So Jesus said to them, "The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going.
Joh 8:12  Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

Worthy Manner
1Th 2:12  we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.
Col 1:10  so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.
Eph 4:1  I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called,

Faith
2Co 5:7  for we walk by faith, not by sight.
Rom 4:12  and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised
  
Love
Eph 5:2  And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

Newness of Life
Rom 6:4  We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

Obedience
2Jn 1:6  And this is love, that we walk according to his commandments; this is the commandment, just as you have heard from the beginning, so that you should walk in it.
Eph 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Rom 13:13  Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.

With and Like Christ
1Jn 2:6  whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.
Col 2:6  Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him,
Zec 10:12  I will make them strong in the LORD, and they shall walk in his name," declares the LORD.
Mic 4:5  For all the peoples walk each in the name of its god, but we will walk in the name of the LORD our God forever and ever.

Spirit
Gal 5:16  But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
Gal 5:25  If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.
Rom 8:4  in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

Example
Php 3:17  Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. Php 3:18  For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ.

Humbly
Mic 6:8  He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
Dan 4:37  Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, for all his works are right and his ways are just; and those who walk in pride he is able to humble.

The walk with God is not a slow stroll either.  Sometimes that relationship is compared to a run:
Run
Heb 12:1  Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,
Php 2:16  holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
1Co 9:24  Do you not know that in a race all the runners compete, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it.
1Co 9:26  So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air.

So, after all that, how's your walk?  I suspect their is room for discouragement.  that is not my intent.  I hope you like me are challenged to walk all these ways but also be helped by this quote From John Piper from his book "Bloodlines" - "If you wait until your shortcomings are remedied, your dreams will die. All our advances are with a limp."

Limp, walk, run...lets get on with it.

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