Week 3
Monday
How are you doing on breaking your old habits? That old way of life may be
catching up with you right now. That happens to all of us. Stop and think for a
minute how long you have been living life the old way. You have spent your
entire life learning to get away with as much as you can. Now you understand the
consequences of those actions and you have allowed Jesus to pay for your sin.
But, those old habits are still there and they die hard. You are not the only
person to ever deal with this problem.
Open your Bible and read Romans 7:17-25.
Notice how Paul opens up these verses. Why do I do wrong things and not do
right things? Have you been asking yourself that question? Truth is, we have two
natures living in us. One nature wants to do things that please God and honor
God. The other nature wants to do things that are wrong in God’s sight. In other
words, you are a war zone.
So, what can you do? First, take a few minutes to think about what drags you
back to old habits. Is it a friendship? A relationship? Is it a song or movie?
Do you have things at your house that you need to get rid of like a stash of
porn, drugs, or alcohol? Second, you need to deal with whatever it is that
tempts you. You may need to end a friendship or relationship or at least add
some new friends that follow God. You may need to get rid of something that
tempts you. Finally, you need to tell the person holding you accountable about
your temptation. Remember, we talked last week about not going it alone.
Finally, this week let’s memorize a verse that reminds us of who we are. Open
to 2
Corinthians 5:17. Memorize that verse this week.
Take a few minutes to pray. Ask God to help you to deal with temptation.
Thank Him for forgiving you when you fail.
Tuesday
Has it been tough to explain to your old friends exactly why you are so
different? I bet there have been some interesting conversations going on the
past few weeks. Everyone wants to know what makes you act so different. They’re
curious about your new direction in life. Some people just don’t understand.
Maybe you’ve been made fun of or some people won’t talk to you anymore. What
happened when your new friends and old friends met?
Open your Bible to 1 Peter 2:11-12. Read those verses a few times.
Did you catch that first verse? You are an alien, not from Mars or Jupiter,
but you are someone in a place where you do not belong anymore. In other words,
you are a Christian living in a world that doesn’t understand your faith. In
some ways, you are like a soldier caught in enemy territory. That’s where the
hostility exists.
So, how do we respond to this hostility? We can’t beat people up or resort to
name-calling. The people who are rejecting you are the same people Jesus died
for. In fact, you used to be just like them a few days ago. I Peter
2:12 tells us what to do. We are to live good lives. When we are treated
poorly, we treat people nice in return. We pray for people who do not like us or
understand Christians. We return hate and rejection with love and acceptance. It
may be hard to do, but God will enable you to love your enemies.
Take a few minutes and pray. Pray for your friends who do not understand your
faith in Jesus. Ask God to give you patience and understanding with them. Ask
God to use you to tell your old friends about Jesus.
Remember, we are memorizing 2 Corinthians 5:17 this week. Work on it for
five minutes today.
Wednesday
Want to get a peek at the first verses I ever memorized? I am not perfect
remembering every verse, but these really stuck with me. Open your Bible and
read 1
Timothy 1:12-17 and take a look at one of my favorite pieces of scripture.
In these verses, Paul is talking about his past. Paul is the guy who wrote
quite a bit of the New Testament in the Bible. Before he met Jesus, he was very
different. Look at the description of his old life. He was violent. He spoke
against what God had done. He did bad things to people who believed in Jesus,
including killing them. His life changed when he met Jesus, but he still had to
live with his past.
You may be dealing with that at this point as well. Often, when we begin to
study God’s word and see what His standards are we begin to feel guilty about
things we did before we met Christ. If we had understood how bad those decisions
would be, we would have acted very different. Like Paul, we acted in ignorance
and unbelief.
What can we do with our past? We can remember that God has forgiven it. We
can be confident that Jesus died so we can be free from our pasts. We still deal
with consequences for some bad decisions in our past, but we do not have to
worry about God being mad at us or not forgiving us. Further, we can let the
changes in our lives be a demonstration to others that God can forgive anyone-
as Paul says, even the worst of sinners.
Take a few minutes today and thank God for forgiving your past. Ask God to
help you to bury the past and look to the future you have serving Him. Ask God
to use the changes in your life to reach others. Remember the verse you are
memorizing, 2 Corinthians 5:17? You are a new creation!
Thursday
While growing up, the guy who taught me about Jesus was the only Christian in
his family. His parents ridiculed his faith, grounded him from church, and
generally made him miserable because he had chosen to follow Jesus. Today, you
may be in the same place. Many students today are the only believer in their
family.
It can be really tough to be a Christian in a family that does not know
Jesus. Do you want to know how my friend survived? Read Ephesians
6:1-3.
Now you may say, “Obey? Honor? How do I do that when they don’t even know
God!?!” It isn’t easy. Being a child who believes in Christ and in a family of
unbelievers is tough. Your parents are watching your every move. They want to
see if you will live what you say you believe. They want to know if you are
authentic. It’s going to be tough sometimes, but God’s commands do not change,
no matter our circumstances.
So, how did my friend survive? He took their criticism in silence. He prayed
for his parents every day and was a servant to them. He tried to be the best son
he could be. He obeyed his parents and submitted to their punishments whether he
agreed or not. By the way, it was tough.
You may be the main person helping your family understand Jesus. God may have
saved you to reach your parents. Trust God. He will not put you in a situation
you cannot endure. Ask your accountability partner to keep watch over your
relationship with your parents.
If your parents are Christians, then you still must live out your faith in
front of them. Seek to honor and serve them as well. Talk to them about what God
is teaching you. Pray for them and with them.
Take some time today to pray for your parents. Thank God that He chose to
give you the parents you have.
BTW- Memorize 2 Corinthians 5:17- You can do it!
Friday
Living the Christian life is a struggle sometimes. We can still get bogged
down in sin. We still act like the old us sometimes. Some days we make poor
choices and the guilt follows us around for days or weeks. Sometimes when our
poor choices are made public, even those we consider our Christian friends look
at us like, “Are you really saved?” That is not how God looks at us. No one can
separate a person from Christ once the relationship has begun. Don’t believe me?
Check out the Bible.
Open to Romans 8:37-39. Read those verses a couple of
times. Let them sink in real good.
Did you catch the first part of verse 38? Nothing can separate us. There
isn’t an action, word, sin, or person who can snatch us from the hand of God
once the relationship has begun. You rest in God’s hand because of your decision
to ask Him into your life a few weeks ago. You cannot be separated from God.
What does this mean? Should we just do whatever we want? No way! We know how
that ends up. (Besides we are new creations, remember the verse you are
memorizing 2
Corinthians 5:17- quote it now!) We don’t want to go back to the chronic
guilt and pain and despair of our pasts. We live in victory. When we sin, we ask
forgiveness and move forward. We cannot be separated from God’s forgiveness.
Take a few minutes and talk to God. Thank Him for your secure salvation.
Thank Him for His forgiveness. Ask Him to help you to stay on the right
path.
Weekend Three
During the weekend take some time to meditate on scripture. Write down what
God taught you this week. If you are reading the Bible in a book, rather than on
this CD, circle key words that seem really important as you read through the
scriptures for the weekend. If there is one verse that stands out, underline
that verse so you can easily find it later. Here are scriptures for Saturday and
Sunday.
Saturday: Psalm 51
Sunday: James 3:1-12