“He energizes those who get tired, gives fresh strength to dropouts. For even young people tire and drop out, young folk in their prime stumble and fall. BUT those who wait upon God get fresh strength. They spread their wings and soar like eagles, They run and don’t get tired, they walk and don’t lag behind.” Isaiah 40:29-31 The Message, emphasis added.
Thank God for the proverbial BUT’S in scripture. Why? Because, if you are anything like me (human and frail), you are very acquainted with tiredness, weakness, dropping out, stumbling and seemingly lagging behind everyone else. Even though I know it’s unwise to compare myself and/or my Christian walk with those around me: I still tend to judge myself rather un-mercifully. BUT, Jesus doesn’t!
Isaiah was introducing the simple laws of aerodynamics which lift us to soar:
- 1. Attitude determines altitude...But, (there’s that ‘Butt’ again) I have plenty of attitude. Not exactly what Papa had in mind? Think of all the different attitudes you have displayed or experienced from others. Yikes! Not such a pretty picture. Paul shared what “attitude” determines how we soar;”Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5 NIV).
“Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process…
Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all created beings in heaven and on earth—even those long ago dead and buried—will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father” (Phil. 2: 5-11, The Message, emphasis added.)
The attitude that produces altitude is to think of you the way Jesus thought of himself. Become a servant and take on his humility as a human. It’s not our humanity that produces the wrong attitude; it is the prideful ‘attitude’ of thinking ‘you’ does not need Papa to lift ‘you’ daily as a son of man. One, who in humility serves is lifted into the resurrection power of Jesus! In his humility, we are lifted from the status of a slave to the grace of becoming an adopted son or daughter of God. Life lived in the attitude of ‘pride’ will continue to bust its “buts’’ on the tarmac of life. Christ’s attitude lifts us to soar in him!
Think about it; we must daily have the attitude adjustment of living by grace, not by self-focused effort. Papa resists the proud and gives grace to the humble! We will examine the two other simple ‘laws’ of aerodynamics in the next “Nurture”.
Gripped by Papa’s soaring grace! Ron Ross
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