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Are You A Stuffed Christian?

How like to a Christian a man may be and yet possess no vital godliness! Walk through the British Museum, and you will see all the orders of animals standing in their various places, and exhibiting themselves with the utmost possible propriety. The rhinoceros demurely retains the position in which he was set at first, the eagle soars not through the window, the wolf howls not at night; every creature, whether bird, beast, or fish, remains in the particular glass case allotted to it; but you all know well enough that these are not the creatures, but only the outward semblances of them.

Yet in what do they differ? Certainly in nothing which you could readily see, for the well-stuffed animal is precisely like what the living animal would have been; and that eye of glass even appears to have more of brightness in it than the natural eye of the creature itself; yet you know well enough that there is a secret inward something lacking, which, when it has once departed, you cannot restore.

So in the churches of Christ, many professors are not living believers, but stuffed believers, stuffed Christians. There is all the external of religion, everything that you could desire, and they behave with a great deal of propriety, too; they all keep their places, and there is no outward difference between them and the living, except upon the vital point, the life which no power on earth could possibly confer. There is this essential distinction, the life is absent.

It is almost painful to watch little children when some little pet of theirs has died, how they can hardly realize the difference between death and life! Your little boy’s bird moped for awhile upon its perch, and at last dropped down in the cage; and do not you remember how the little fellow tried to set it up, and gave it seed, and filled its glass with water, and was quite surprised to think that birdie would not open his little eye upon his friend as it did before, and would not take its seed, nor drink its water! Ah, you had at last to make him know that a mysterious something had gone from his little favourite, and would not come back again.

There is just such a spiritual difference between the mere professor and the genuine Christian. There is an invisible, but most real, indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the absence or the presence of which makes all the difference between the sinner and the saint.

From a sermon by Charles H. Spurgeon entitled “Life’s Ever-Springing Well,” delivered April 4, 1869.

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He put a powerful word in my heart that it is very simple to follow God:

First, you learn to hear what God says

Then, you walk in obedience to that word.

He will never lead you wrong and you will always be using your time in the wisest way.

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Many Christians feel that they must be busy doing something that is religious or God won’t be pleased with them.

I know I used to feel that way. The first time the Holy Spirit instructed me not to take part in a major yearly event in the church, I was consumed with guilt. I won’t name it because then some of you might get the idea that it was the specific event that was wrong. The event was not wrong at all, but God had other plans for my life that week, and He revealed Himself to me in a way that I have never forgotten.

Sometimes I think that He just wants to see if we will obey Him – PERIOD, end of story. He also wants to see if we can just “be still and listen” to what He has to say. Sometimes He has to go to drastic measures to get our attention. When the Israelites were in the wilderness, when the Cloud that was over the Tabernacle moved, they were to pack all their belongings and follow it until it stopped. Then they were to set up camp again.

I’m sure they couldn’t always see the logic in where they stopped, but God was trying to teach them to have an ultimate obedience in Him.

Don’t get the idea that you should just not participate in an event because you don’t want to and say that God told you not to do it. I found out that some things happened that week that were not pleasing at all to God, and I think He may have wanted to spare me some stress and extra pain. He knew beforehand that all those things would happen.

Through the years I have found that if I walk each day with the three things above in mind, my days will definitely go much smoother. Then when I lay down to go to sleep, I have the definite assurance that what I have done has really counted for the Kingdom of God.

Try it and see what God does in your life!

Related posts:

1. God made our magnificent sun (photos)!
2. Don’t Make Christianity Harder Than It Has To Be!

The words say what I want for my life. I don’t want to waste another second just going through the motions each day and wasting time. I want God to be able to radically use me to accomplish His Work here on earth. I don’t want to be afraid to stand for Him.

Let’s make the choice to make each day count for something eternal!

The Motions by Matthew West

Check out my other sites:

Handbook for Victorious Christian Living – Practical ways to learn to live a victorious Christian life

Blueprint for Victorious Christian Living

Power of the Living Word

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The news programs heard about it and went to interview her. She didn’t seem like she was afraid at all. She just told what happened in a matter-of-fact way. This video is definitely worth watching.

The above is a brief synopsis for those who don’t have broadband.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDmp967UMds&hl=en&rel=0&color1=0x3a3a3a&color2=0x999999&border=1]

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1. Will you give all your burdens to God?