Lasting Change

We all want lasting changes in our lives. We may want to change our diet, we may want to change our sleeping habits. Many times the desire to see a change doesn’t meet with the effort to carry out the change. We think more often than we make it happen, and when we do make changes in our lives, they often don’t last.

Trying to change what you do won't last. You have to change who you are.

Lasting change comes from a change in our soul, which is a much deeper part of who we are than our physical actions or even our will or emotions. We can begin to change our soul by changing our will and actions, but a soul change is something that happens over time. Lasting change begins by making the first choice. Each choice we make feeds our soul. If we only feed our souls french fries and chicken nuggets, it will only want fries and chicken nuggets. If we feed our souls fruit and vegetables, our souls will crave fruits and vegetables. Our souls will become what they are feed by our choices.

The root of sin is pride because pride is the opposite of love. 

The greatest choice we can make that will bring health and lasting change to our life is to love others. Love is about making others better, and we do that by actively doing what's in their best interest. Pride is about ourselves - how we think we are cool and how we can make ourselves cooler. God is love (1 John 4:8). While God deserves all glory and honor, He chooses to love others rather than demand obedience. Since God is love, the Trinity is a necessity because love must have another person to act in the best interest of.

Following God should put your own life at risk.

Jesus put it this way, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24). God is love, but He will not share His glory. For us to receive the greatest thing God has for us, we have to give up the greatest thing we have, our lives. Serving God is the best decision we can make, but it has to be a selfless decision. We have to lay our own lives down and put our agenda at risk in order to serve God.