September 15 | 1 Peter 4:1-11
PRAYER PRACTICE
Spoken Prayer – Out loud, pray for God to speak to you through the reading. Praise God for giving us His word. Ask the Spirit to help you read with faith, and to live out what you hear from God through the passage.
DAILY READING:
1 Peter 4:1-11
For more help use this Bible Study method
REFLECTION
Power On
by Karen Burkhart
It's been said that dying for Christ is easy, it's living for Him that's hard. I couldn't agree more. Though I hope I am never in a position where someone with a gun is demanding I renounce my faith in Christ, I expect my response would be something akin to: Over my dead body. You see, I know that momentary suffering is nothing compared to the joy that awaits me in heaven. Still, if I could write the script for my life, the final scene would be set at home surrounded by my loved ones. Thankfully, few of us will ever be called to literally die for Christ, but all of us are called to live for Him--moment by moment, day by day, year by year.
So, what makes living for Christ so hard? For starters, people naturally love the way of least resistance but living for Christ means always swimming upstream. Sometimes the current is tumultuous like the Colorado River and other times gentle like a lazy river at the waterpark, but in either case, exhaustion is inevitable. Further, with each labored breath, temptation mounts to grab hold of one of the many ropes tossed from friends and strangers alike floating blissfully downstream in the endless parade of rafts. It takes great resolve and endurance to keep one’s eyes fixed and body progressing upstream toward the only Source of hope.