April 23, 2010
I have spoken on this in small group and thought I would just share real fast. What's in your cup? If you were to be walking with a cup of OJ and someone bumped you, or you tripped or just lost balance, what would fall out? Would Pepsi come out? Chocolate milk? Juice? Gasoline? You get the point. No, OJ would come out. It's the same with our own lives. We can walk around with some really ugly stuff inside of us and as we trip in life or get bumped, that is what is going to come out. You can be the sweetest, most generous, loving person....when all is going your way but what happens when you get bumped? Does that love come out or does anger, selfishness, greed, manipulation, self pity spill out? It would be easy to have a very lovely cup of poison carried around, not harming anyone as long as it is never bumped, and doesn't spill out. But it's only when those things do spill out when you see what you are filled with and a change is required.
That might be the hardest part. How do you change it? You can vow you will never do it again, tell yourself you have more will power, etc but when we try to do it on our won we can only do it so long before we erupt again. It will happen again. So the change is a process. Its a process of responding to the Holy Spirit conviction IN the problem. A little mini victory, and then over and over these responses that are mini victories turn into battles and wars being won. Picture a brick wall. The wall sin't one whole slab, rather it's made up of small bricks. The small bricks together make a strong wall. Don't ever look at your mini victory as too insignificant but rather a piece of something bigger and stronger. We will fail again and again but as we respond we will eventually win the war.
