Wear It; It Looks Good on You!

3 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. ² 

³ For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. ⁴ When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. ⁵ Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. ⁶ Because of these, the wrath of God is coming.⁷ You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. ⁸ But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. ⁹ Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices ¹⁰ and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. ¹¹ Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.¹² Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. ¹³ Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. ¹⁴ And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.¹⁵ Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. ¹⁶ Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. ¹⁷ And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Colossians 3:1-17 NIV  

A call to change is what I almost titled this post. Pete used this portion of scripture last night while teaching the Youth Connection.  As soon as he read this portion out loud that was the first thing that came to mind. People hate change in general. They like what is comfortable. When we make a decision to accept Christ we are committing to change. Thank goodness God is patient with us!

So how do we go about this transformation? Set your mind on things above. Focus on Jesus! When we start to slip back into old patterns get refocused! Read the Word, pray and worship. Whenever I get mad at someone I try to make it a habit to pray! If I am praying I cannot focus on the anger or the person that made me mad because I am talking to Jesus! Not only that if I am praying then I am giving God room to work in the situation!

Verse 12 says to clothe yourselves in compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Then read on to vs. 13 and 14 and it says that we need to be flexible (my words), and forgiving just as the Lord has forgiven us.  Wow. I don’t know about you but there are some days that I don’t want to wear that “love outfit.” But love is something that is done unconditionally. It doesn’t matter if I “feel” like it. God didn’t say, “If you feel like loving or forgiving someone today then go ahead and do it.” He said to clothe yourself in it! WEAR IT, OWN IT! But above all of those really good virtues put on love because it is the love that is at the source.

Jesus loves me and you so much that He died to save us. He forgives me for so much and if I remember that then it should make it way easier for me to forgive someone for something petty or irritating. I love vs. 15 because it instructs us to be thankful. God loves grateful kids! When we take time to be thankful over the little things and the big things, well, life just gets better! You see so much more of what God does all of the time instead of becoming so limited in vision of the circumstances that surrounds you. So by now you can see that I changed the title of my post today to “Wear It; It Looks Good on You!”

Lord, thank You for your unending, unconditional love. Thank You for forgiving me of everything that I do. Thank You for my family and friends. Thank You for my job. Thank You for helping to wear compassion and kindness. Help me to be to shiny like You would have me to be to others and God, thank You for my foo foo coffee, I love it! Thanks for letting me be me but helping me to be more like You all at the same time. I love You.

Shanin