40 Days of Spiritual RebootSample

Today is the last day in this first segment of our forty day period. Today we are going to look into the mind and heart of Jesus during His time on earth. We want to revisit where he drew his sense of self from and his source of life. And what was true for him can only be more true for us too. Today we come to terms with the very source and reason for our being. This will help us climax our conviction of intimacy with God. There… is… no… higher… pursuit!!!

CENTRE DOWN

You should start getting used to your place and bible and notebook by now. If you’re still struggling to find your spot or get comfortable… its not too late to change and look for something better. This is not a short term advantage. This is a life habit you’re working on. Long after everything changes… this will still be your water-well. So learn to draw well and draw deep. Here is where you’ll find the strength for the greatest challenges that will face you… the deepest losses that will rob you… the greatest twists that will surprise you.

Get on youtube and listen to ‘This is the air I breathe‘. Spend sometime in unhurried worship, surrender and abandonment to God. Listen carefully to the words and let the artist sing for you. Open you heart to a hunger that will devour all other hungers. A hunger for God himself.

OPEN YOUR BIBLE

Open your Bible to Mathew 4:1 - 11. You will read this twice today.

First time - Read the passage slowly and look for the emotion, context and circumstances of this event. How early in the story, Jesus has to deal with the reality of opposition, loneliness and carnal alternatives. You’ll find that everything that is the enemy of the spiritual life is found right here in this encounter Jesus has with Satan and right here are also the answers.

The question however is a matter of conviction. To the depth that we believe that God’s Word is our life source, to that depth we will wait, worship or wander.

Second time - Note the lies in this passage and the confidence with which the tempter hopes to fool the very Son of God. e.g. ‘If you are the Son of God’ (v. 3) The issue is hunger but the question is identity. Jesus doesn’t launch into a defence of his person. Staying focus on the need at hand… his harsh hunger on the 40th day of his fast in the wilderness… He quotes scripture to give him strength and states… ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God’ (v. 4). Jesus was a physical man, a hungry man but also a complete man. He knew the constitution of the human existence. That we are first and foremost spiritual beings. That if our spirit is full, nourished, satisfied… then even on the 40th day of a fast out in the wilderness… the devil would be no match for us. He wasn’t the summation of his appetites. He WAS the product of God’s life-giving word. And by THAT he was sustained.

Well, was there margin for temptation? A shortcut perhaps to quicker glory?

(v. 6 - “If you are the Son of God”. v. 9 - “All these things i will give you if you fall down and worship me“. Some more lies from the serpents tongue.)

Jesus was tempted on the matter of security and with a shortcut to glory without the cross. You have probably made these observations in your first reading. In your second reading look for how Jesus handles these. He quotes scripture...

* ‘You shall not tempt the LORD your God’

* ‘You shall worship the LORD your God and Him only you shall serve’.

Note the next two things that happen. The devil left him when he used truth as a weapon. And angels came and ministered to him.

When we don’t fall for Satans lies, we are then served by Angelic allies.

All the answers to life’s deepest question are both raised and answered in this encounter and Jesus shows his rested knowledge in them.

What is the breath of life that living beings truly need? Where does security come from? Who calls our worship and life to account?

In restoring intimacy with God, we soon realise this is not a mystical union but a theological conviction that leads us to the practical plugin to God for life, worship and life again. The secret to intimacy with God is tied into the truth realisation that ‘I am a spiritual being, made for worship and communion with Him’. When I live in THIS reality, every carnal temptation is easily overcome and victory will become a way of life.

COME CLEAN

The switch to living in the spirit rather than from the dictates of carnal appetites requires some repentance and consequential commitment to developing spiritual hunger.

Fasting can do this. But you still have to make that decision.

Admit it. You thought you were primarily a physical being. And that you just cannot live without food and water.

Admit too… that in your ignorance… you left the spiritual man inside you hungry, vulnerable to attack and disconnected from his life source… the person of God. For months. For years.

Announce… that you’re back. Back to feed on Him.

Back with a holy passion to be satisfied in God and God alone.

To know what it means to be full while the outer man wastes away. To get to a place like Jesus where you too can say… ‘My food is to do the will of Him who sent me’.

EXIT WITH PERMISSION

Worship.

Repeat V. 10 using the first person singular. ‘I shall worship…’.