Step 3: The Decision: I Think I’ll Let Him; Step 4: The Examination: A Fearless Inventory
Daily Scripture
Luke 1:25-38; Psalm 139:23-24; Galatians 6:4
Luke 1
25 “This is the Lord’s doing. He has shown his favor to me by removing my disgrace among other people.”
26 When Elizabeth was six months pregnant, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a city in Galilee, 27 to a virgin who was engaged to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David’s house. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28 When the angel came to her, he said, “Rejoice, favored one! The Lord is with you!” 29 She was confused by these words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. 30 The angel said, “Don’t be afraid, Mary. God is honoring you. 31 Look! You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. 32 He will be great and he will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of David his father. 33 He will rule over Jacob’s house forever, and there will be no end to his kingdom.”
34 Then Mary said to the angel, “How will this happen since I haven’t had sexual relations with a man?”
35 The angel replied, “The Holy Spirit will come over you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore, the one who is to be born will be holy. He will be called God’s Son. 36 Look, even in her old age, your relative Elizabeth has conceived a son. This woman who was labeled ‘unable to conceive’ is now six months pregnant. 37 Nothing is impossible for God.”
38 Then Mary said, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” Then the angel left her.
Psalm 139
23 Examine me, God! Look at my heart!
Put me to the test! Know my anxious thoughts!
24 Look to see if there is any idolatrous way in me,
then lead me on the eternal path!
Galatians 6
4 Each person should test their own work and be happy with doing a good job and not compare themselves with others.
Daily Reflection & Prayer
This week’s GPS offers a very brief introduction to the Bible principles in John Ortberg’s book Steps. Please use this GPS to whet your desire to read the book, not as a substitute for it. If you’re already eager to go deeper, click here to learn how to study the book with others, in person or online.
“We make the decision to turn our life and will over to the care of God as we understand him. The only way into spiritual life is to surrender—to die to our ego, our self-will, and our demand to have our own way and have the world revolve around ourselves.” * Then “in the fourth step… we examine our lives and our character thoroughly. We shine light on those nooks and crannies we have avoided…. We all resist facing ugly truths about ourselves. We must be deeply and genuinely convinced about the need for taking inventory.” **
- “We think we’ve surrendered our time—until somebody wants it. We think we’ve surrendered our circumstances—until they don’t suit us. We think we’ve surrendered our will—until it gets crossed.” *** Why do you need to make surrendering your life to God a daily, even an hourly, choice rather than a one-time emotional experience?
- Your personal inventory must be fearless because it must be specific. Christian psychologist Lewis Smedes said, “Precisely what is it that you need forgiveness for? For being unfaithful to your spouse last year? Good, you can work on that. For being an evil sort of person? No, that is too much; you cannot swallow yourself whole.” **** Are you willing to invest time (“I don’t have time” is a common way to avoid this step) in letting God guide you to fearlessly assess your life?
Prayer
O God, like the psalmist I pray, “Examine me.” I cannot surrender to you what I do not recognize or am not willing to face. Give me the strength to be honest with myself and you. Amen.
GPS Insights
Denise Mersmann
Denise Mersmann serves as the Care Coordination Director for the churchwide Care Central department at Church of the Resurrection.
It can be very hard to honestly examine my innermost thoughts and feelings. I struggle to truly do a deep dive into why I do things that I shouldn’t, because I know the answer won’t make me feel good about myself.
Add to that my methodology is not particularly sound. It’s more of a random and unplanned “What are areas where I need to let go? What do I need to surrender to God”? Well, everywhere and everything, actually. So that leaves a lot of room where my little thoughts can wander from thing to thing, pausing to consider how great it would be if God got me on track in all the areas that come to mind.
The trouble is, because I tend to focus broad and not deep, I manage to avoid identifying specifics that I don’t want to face. I can gloss over some of my biggest shortcomings or justify not quite surrendering completely to God. As I think about John Ortberg’s call to completely surrender my life to God, I think about how often I have said things like, “God, I give my time to you, whatever, whenever something needs to be done, I am there!” And even with my watered-down nonspecific version of surrendering, it seems like by the next day, I have missed the mark. I have managed to somehow retain control and not truly resigned myself to God’s will and His way.
So how can I truly and thoroughly examine my character and my life? I think it has to be just like eating an elephant–one tiny bite at a time. Rather than committing all my time to doing God’s will, what if I started with a little nibble. “God, I give you my Sunday mornings. I will focus that time on worship and serving your people. My focus will be fully on you–without social media.”
As I surrender that time, and live into that promise, I can reexamine my life and find additional places where I need to turn over control and take another little bite of that elephant. Handing over control of another small and specific area, in a way that will allow me to honor God, while also acknowledging my own struggles in yielding to God’s will.
My hope is that as I continue to snack on that elephant, a tiny piece at a time, I will develop a taste for it. I will want to bite off more, to look deeper, and surrender more. I don’t think this elephant is going down easy, but I do believe that if I commit myself to the steps, my life will change in ways I can only imagine!
© 2024 Resurrection: A United Methodist Church. All Rights Reserved.
Scripture quotations are taken from The Common English Bible ©2011. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
References
* Ortberg, John, Steps: A Guide to Transforming Your Life When Willpower Isn’t Enough (p. 60). Tyndale House Publishers. Kindle Edition.
** Ibid., p. 87-88.
*** Ibid., p. 82.
**** Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive and Forget: Healing the Hurts We Don’t Deserve (New York: Pocket Books, 1988), p. 103.
