01 Jun Living for Christ – June 12

By Ferdinand Haratua

Stan Gerlach was a successful businessman who was well known in the community. One day, Stan was giving a eulogy at a memorial service when he decided to share the gospel. At the end of his message, Stan told the mourners: “You never know when God is going to take your life. At that moment, there’s nothing you can do about it. Are you ready?” Then Stan sat down, fell over, and died. His wife and sons tried to resuscitate him, but there was nothing they could do – just as Stan had said a few minutes earlier. (Francis Chan, Crazy Love, p.46)

There are at least two facts of life that all of us would agree with: firstly, that all of us will die, and secondly, we do not know when it will happen. Moses writes that our lives are “like grass, in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; in the evening it fades and withers.” (Psalm 90:5–6 ESV)

The fact is only because of the grace of God that we are still breathing today. The bible tells us that we are not our own for God has bought us with a costly price, therefore we ought to glorify God with our lives (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). We belong to Christ.

However, it is sad that many of us so called Christians do not live our lives for Christ. We

are still busy storing up earthly possessions and forever seeking comforts. And as soon as we get uncomfortable, we will do our best to get back to comfort again.

The bible sounds many warnings for us about this. James writes, “Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” (James 4:13-14)

Jesus told a parable of the rich fool; “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.” But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.” (Luke 12:16–21)

So, how then should we live our lives? The apostle Paul writes, “it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” (Philippians 1:20–21)

Like Paul, let our passions be that in our lives Christ is honoured and magnified. Pursue Christ at all cost and may Jesus be the ultimate satisfaction in our lives; so that one day we could say with the apostle, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2 Timothy 4:7)