I have been sick for a few days. I knew I felt exhausted, but kept pushing myself to go on, because I didn't feel ill. Yesterday it hit me that I should take my temperature. Voila! I indeed had a fever - low grade, but a degree higher than normal. Now I understood the problem. I only did things that were relaxing to me from that point on and now today I am much better.
Many times in life we sense there is a problem, but since we cannot put our finger on it, we ignore it. We go on acting as if we felt nothing until one day it hits us what the problem is, or we are too late and it has escalated beyond repair. If we would take time out to decipher our feelings and why we have them in the first place, we perhaps could diffuse the situation with prayer and action. However, we tend to migrate to the things we understand the easiest and fastest, thereby causing us more problems than necessary. It takes too much effort to search things out. Our immediate desires are all that matter - until......
The verse above is about salvation - dying to self and living for Christ. However, as with every verse of Scripture, we can glean even more from this than the obvious. If we die to self daily, we accomplish His goals daily. So think about if we died to self moment by moment. Sin would not so easily beset us. If we produce much fruit simply in receiving salvation and as we grow and learn to die to self daily in life we begin to produce even more, then how productive would we be if we made a concentrated effort to die moment by moment? This would take much work at first. We would need to concentrate on Jesus and His great love and sacrifice to the point that it becomes so much a part of us that we can go nowhere and do nothing without thinking about what He would have us do.
It is wearying to think about, but well worth the effort.
Rearing children teaches us what God goes through with us. If we take the time to pray and listen to His voice before disciplining, getting angry, agreeing with them, etc., we end up with children who rise up and call us blessed (Proverbs 31:28). If we do not, we end up with children who disgrace us (Proverbs 29:15). None of us does this perfectly, but those who try are rewarded with God's promises.
We get frustrated when our children refuse to listen, because we want them to produce quality fruit. The saying "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree" holds true. We are the example, so we need to do the work of praying for and with our children, loving them unconditionally, rewarding them with our love and appreciation rather than material possessions and setting the example of obedience by our own obedience to our heavenly Father.
Death to self produces the fruit of life to our children. What better produce can there be?
Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.Psalm 127:3-5
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