Jesus invites me into poverty of spirit and reveals an almost immeasurable urgency by saying, “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:20).”
The Living Word connects my entrance into the kingdom of heaven with being poor in spirit.
Why then do we exert so much energy, effort, and time to propping up our imagined spiritual assets? Why build a sense of righteousness on a non-existent foundation of self capacity? Why pretend before the All Knowing God?
This 21 Days of Fasting and Prayer I am inviting you into the place of contemplation pictured in the song, “Shut in with God in a Secret Place.”
The sweet Spirit of God begins to open our eyes to various props with which we avoid our total inability to effect salvation or right standing with God.
From my perspective, the largest and most significant prop we hold and that prohibits us from “taking hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of us,” is “I.”
The western world has deified personal opinion. “I think” has become this generation’s “infallible and authoritative word of god.” The God of the Ten Commandments, 1 Corinthians 13, and the Beatitudes has been replaced by the false god of “my opinion.”
The “My Opinion Idol” is worshiped, even to the point of human sacrifice, by millions of folks who have been tricked into the myth of personal opinion transcendence.
However, this idolization of personal opinion is not a new practice.
The children of Israel did the same thing as recorded in Judges 21:25, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” It didn’t end well for Israel and it won’t end well for us.
Total surrender to the Word of God, the will of God, and the ways of God is the only antidote to this diabolical idol. I must be crucified with Christ! All the way on the cross. Dead to self entirely.
In your fasting and prayer closet, will you ask God to “tear down my idols of personal opinion so I stand totally dependent upon God and His grace?”