By Grace, not by works, but works reflect a thankful, indebted heart.  I am useful to God, but I doubt that He ever needed me.  For what benefit does God receive for my righteousness, my piety, my performance?  None.  God defined righteousness so that when we encounter it we might name what we have seen.  He gave me His righteousness, as propitiation for my own lack thereof.  I do not breathe except that He created air, and lungs and autonomous nervous system reactions.  What He gave me was freedom from sin and death, a death I deserved for the sin that I committed, in violation of His defined terms and law.  He told me do a job, He allows me a choice to obey but obedience requires a command and a consequence.  I am to be Holy because that is what He wants me to be and here’s the kicker, He is the only one who can make that happen.  So, it’s His life, His definition, His rules, His righteousness, His power and His authority by which it gets done.  Where in that equation do I see any action for which I may accept glory for or criticism of acts for which I have no other impact but surrender and obedience?

What then is my part if I may accept no commendation for action or reward for self-help well performed?  My job is to want to be changed and know that God is faithful to complete that transformation.  My job is to love Him with every fiber of my being/reality and reason.  My job is to joyfully accept what He has given, including difficulty and obstructive circumstance for those are the exact moments at which I need Him most.  Those are the moments when I will truly see His hand upon my existence and know completely that I had no part in the miracle.  That is when I am a victim and victor of Glory.  My job is to love you enough to forgive you every time you ask and spend every ounce of the knowledge, sweat, cash and energy God has given me to make sure that you join us in eternity.  I must care enough to act and in so doing demonstrate my faith in God’s Plan.

The enemy serves God, the Lord Jesus rebuke Him if He so chooses.  He drives me to God for protection, love and direction or repentance as reaction to  discipline.  I cannot fight the battles to which God’s enemy’s goad me.  It is not my fight, it is not my power that the enemy fears, they fear Christ.  It is the Holy Spirit inside me from which they run, their only hope to get me into my flesh, denying my fealty and entering in to skirmish that I may not win.  My weapons are prayer and use of God’s Holy Word, none of these emanate from my authority.  I shall not be cajoled, prodded or deceived into trying to fight where I may not win.  I will remain victorious in Christ, standing in courage and the knowledge that my God fights for me.  Bring me the giants, for they cannot stand on the field my God prepares before me.  This is my task to bring Glory to His Name in a life well lived for Him, in Him, through His power, Grace and authority.  In Jesus Name I walk.  Amen