Me on Your Mind - a Five-Day Reading Plan by Matthew WestSample

Your Progress on His Mind

There is something about Paul’s words from prison in Philippians that always makes me feel like God has me on His mind. Paul’s message brings me comfort and encouragement at the same time. I hope they will do the same for you today.

I love Paul’s honest assessment of where he was in his pursuit of the perfectly spiritual life. In short, he knew he was not there yet. He was a work in progress. So are we. Paul’s pursuit was the same as all Christ followers; to fully know Christ. But as long as we live, we will never fully know the God whose ways are higher than our ways and whose understanding is greater than ours. We will never reach the endless depths of His love for us, either. And we will never succeed in living a perfectly blameless life. In other words, we will be works in progress every day of our lives.

But we are not just any old work in progress, we are God’s work in progress. His creation, and the object of His love. He does not wait for you to reach perfection before He pursues you with His love. Christ died for us “while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8).” Let’s follow Paul’s example today by doing three things:

1. Confess our sins. Acknowledge that we too are works in progress.
2. Don’t dwell on the past. Instead, keep our eyes on Jesus.
3. Move forward with the goal of knowing Jesus more and more each day!

God has your progress on His mind today. Follow in Paul’s footsteps and make the choice to be “single-minded” in your pursuit of the prize of knowing Jesus more each day and not beating yourself up for being a work in progress. God loves you and will continue to make you more and more like Him as long as knowing Him is your heart’s true pursuit.

DO SOMETHING:

1. Are you pressing forward in your pursuit of knowing Jesus? What are ways you are “pressing forward?”
2. Do you find yourself spending too much time focusing on your past?