Today's "My Utmost For His Highest" by Oswald Chambers is another great gauge of our spirituall maturity!
The “Go” Of Unconditional Identification
One thing thou lackest:…come, take up the cross, and follow
Me. — Mark 10:21
The rich young ruler had the master passion to be perfect.
When he saw Jesus Christ, he wanted to be like Him. Our Lord never puts
personal holiness to the fore when He calls a disciple; He puts absolute
annihilation of my right to myself and identification with Himself — a
relationship with Himself in which there is no other relationship. Luke 14:26
has nothing to do with salvation or sanctification, but with unconditional
identification with Jesus Christ. Very few of us know the absolute “go” of
abandonment to Jesus.
“Then Jesus beholding him loved him.” The look of Jesus will
mean a heart broken for ever from allegiance to any other person or thing. Has
Jesus ever looked at you? The look of Jesus transforms and transfixes. Where
you are “soft” with God is where the Lord has looked at you. If you are hard
and vindictive, insistent on your own way, certain that the other person is
more likely to be in the wrong than you are, it is an indication that there are
whole tracts of your nature that have never been transformed by His gaze.
“One thing thou lackest…” The only “good thing” from Jesus
Christ’s point of view is union with Himself and nothing in between.
“Sell whatsoever thou hast…” I must reduce myself until I am
a mere conscious man, I must fundamentally renounce possessions of all kinds,
not to save my soul (only one thing saves a man — absolute reliance upon Jesus
Christ), but in order to follow Jesus. “Come, and follow Me.” And the road is
the way He went.
One thing I DO want to point out here, though, is that when JESUS told the rich, young ruler to "sell what you have and give to the poor", He did NOT say to sell what he had and give it ALL to the poor! JESUS was merely telling the young man to 'liquidate his assets' so that he would be free of the world and the hindrances that come from too clos an association with it. JESUS Himself had a treasurer because HE was involved in giving to the poor, supporting those whom He sent out to minister and was responsbile for the support of HIS 'support team'! This rich, young ruler could have had his own part of this wonderful of ministry of GIVING! If only he had possessed his riches without those riches possessing him! He COULD have been the greatest success story by becoming a giver! You and I can still, today, choose to BE a GIVER and reap the rewards of that! AMEN! Here is Hillsong UNITED with "GO":Shalom in Him!
