THE STANDING CHRISTIAN

Haley Kelly

Imagine I went out and bought a brand new treadmill. And suppose I made it a goal to stand on it every night. But after a few months of repeating this every night I became extremely mad. Even though I was standing on the treadmill every night for months I never once saw results. Eventually I became so furious that I took it back to the store because it was obviously broken.

Now I know you’re thinking, “Uh Haley, of course you won’t see any results by just standing on a treadmill!!”  And I would say that you’re absolutely right! So why do so many of us do the same thing with our faith? For the new believer it’s going to church, repeating a prayer, and labeling ourselves a Christian yet we never take the first step towards becoming more like Christ. I mean, the word Christian means “little Christ” right? So we can’t call ourselves a Christian and expect the label alone to push us to be more like Jesus. We can’t be standing Christians; we have to take the first step to becoming more like Jesus and serving those around us.

Now for the believer who has been in this race for a while… It’s silly to think that you can just stand on a treadmill and expect results, right? But it’s just as silly to choose to stay in the same place spiritually and expect to grow in our faith. Maybe some of us have become comfortable with where we are spiritually and begin to think, “I’m doing it better than the Christian beside me so I’m good!” However, no matter how "Jesus-like" you think you are, you will ALWAYS need more of Jesus. There is always going to be room to grow. But just like Hadley says, “Nothing changes, if nothing changes.”

Read JAMES 4:8

We choose when we want to leave the season we’re in. Pray and ask God to help you move out of this season you’re in and into a time of seeking more of Him. However, we shouldn’t wait around for God to move us. We should take the first step and God will help us take the second.