Serious about Serving - Martin Wiles

All night long I search for you; earnestly I seek for God. Isaiah 26:9 NLT

After nine years of floundering around in the work world, I got serious about an education.

From first to eighth grade, I was serious about school and enjoyed learning. Then the teenage don’t-care bug bit. Joining in the movements of the time, I found myself rebelling against society and education. Why did I need it? Jobs were plentiful. 

After quitting my senior year and then returning six months later, I finally graduated a semester later than my graduating class and entered the work world. The first few years went well, but then the economy turned sour and so did my employment. 

After being laid off from the plant I had worked at since graduation, I found myself working a string of futureless jobs. Nine years after graduation, I finally succumbed to God’s earlier direction and went to college—but now as a married man with a small child. Doing so after graduation would have been easier, but I wasn’t serious then. 

In the prophet Isaiah’s song of praise to the Lord, he expresses his seriousness about serving God. Though I doubt he actually stayed up all night every night seeking God, his word choice relates how much he needed God in his life. 

Perhaps there was a time when Isaiah too wasn’t serious about serving God. After all, it took a hot experience to set him on fire for God (Isaiah 6). 

While God didn’t have to touch my lips with live coals to convince me I needed to get serious about serving Him, He did use a series of disappointments to get me pointed in the right direction. 

Through the payment Jesus made on Calvary’s cross, God demonstrated how serious He was about humanity’s salvation. He wasn’t under obligation to deliver us from our sins, but He didn’t want us to be a lost cause. Christ went all the way for us, and I should do no less for Him. 

Getting serious about serving God is a decision I can make through an act of my free will. God desires this decision and gives everyone the power to make it.  

Decide today that you will be serious about serving God.

Prayer: Father, focus our hearts, minds, and wills on serving You to the best of our ability. 

Looking for a wide selection of genres in Christian books at discount prices? Use coupon MWiles for 20% off. Click here to see selections.

Thanks to all our faithful followers who are "sharing" our posts--please keep it up! We also invite you to follow and like us on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter. Help us spread God's encouragement through his love lines.