Nothing.

  Is that how you would describe you... or your life... or your faith? Hopefully not, because if you view yourself and your life in with that perspective, you are diminishing the gift of life that's been given you. Equally important is the question about what is 'nothing'? I often quote Romans 8:17 - beginning at the end of v 16

     "... that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs - heirs
      of God and joint heirs with Christ..."

There are other verses also attesting to this status such as Galatians 3:29, 4:7. The point is that there isn't a question of who we've become and are becoming. The question really is - what will we make of our new status? What is our responsibility and opportunity? 'Nothing' should never be our response. 

  Nothing is a poor response to all we've entered into. Webster's defines nothing as: "someone or something that has no interest, value, or importance." One definition says that nothing, "is something that does not exist." That is NOT what has happened when you make Jesus your Lord, when you become a new creature/creation (2 Corinthians 5). Now your life has meaning and purpose as well as quality and fruitfulness.

     "A religion that gives nothing, costs nothing, and suffers nothing,
      is worth nothing." (Martin Luther)

That was a quote in an article on Facebook which was shared with me recently. It definitely sums up what our walk as a Christian should NOT be. Upon our acceptance of Jesus as Lord, we entered an entirely new realm. Sadly, too many of us merely stand in the doorway, peeking in and don't fully enter into this new state: the relationship, the reality of what has happened and was/is available to us. When we don't, we are not acting as co-inheritors along with Jesus. 

     "... faith is good only when it engages truth; when it is made to
      rest upon falsehood it can and often does lead to eternal tragedy.
      For it is not enough that we believe; we must believe the right
      thing about the right One." (A.W. Tozer)

  Accepting Jesus as Lord is not passive. The painful questions may be if Luther's quote defines the present day church ... and/or how we live as Christians? Where do the actions, like prayer, fit into how we live our lives?

     "America is suffering from an extended spiritual drought. While the
      social and moral decay of this hour may grieve us, discernment of
      the larger reason for this blight lies at the door of an all-but-
      prayerless  church." (Jack Hayford)

  As much as I dislike being accusatory, is this true? Is it because prayer is rarely corporate that its place of importance diminishes (in direct proportion to its 'public' value?). Do we take up the standard that exemplified Jesus' life - going apart to pray to the Father? Is prayer, the lack, the reason as Hayford asserts?