I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Galatians 2:20

Before King David gave his son Solomon the plans for The Temple complex he said, “And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts” (1 Chronicles 28:9a).

Confession time. More often then I’d like to admit when God searched the motives behind my service, they fell far short of His command that my attitude be the same as that of Christ Jesus (Philippians 2:5). I’ve volunteered out of a desire to fix and rescue the project, rather than to love and serve people. I’ve stepped into neighborhoods that looked different than mine out of selfish ambition or vain conceit instead of humbly considering them better than myself (Philippians 2:3). That service may have looked admirable on the outside, but the lukewarm waters that God saw when He searched my heart and mind must’ve made Him sick.

Four years into Dr. Helen Roseveare’s twenty-year service (1953-1973) to God in Africa she became aware of some wrong motives in her service, too. It was a Sunday evening when Pastor Ndugu and his wife Tamoma called her out to the fireside to talk and pray. He showed her some impure, hidden areas of her heart that pertained to race prejudice. She said, “The Spirit forced me to acknowledge that subconsciously I did not really believe that an African could be as good a Christian as I was, or could know the Lord Jesus or understand the Bible as I did.”

Pastor Ndugu opened his Bible to Galatians 2:20. With his heal, he draw a straight line in the dirt floor. “I,” he said, “The capital I in our lives, Self, is the great enemy . . .

“Helen . . . the trouble with you is that we can see so much Helen that we cannot see Jesus.”

Her eyes filled with tears and Pastor Ndugu’s object lesson continued. He drew another line in the dirt across the I he had previously drawn and said, “May I suggest that you lift your heart to God and pray, ‘Please, God, cross out the I.’”

Helen wrote, “There in the dirt was his lesson of simplified theology – the Cross – the crossed-out I life.” I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20).

PASSION Step: What is central to your service: Your ego or Christ’s life in you? Zealously serve with a crossed-out I life.

The greatest competitor of true devotion to Jesus is the service we do for Him. It is easier to serve than to pour out our lives completely for Him. Are we more devoted to service than we are to Jesus Himself?
Oswald Chambers

In Kindergarten one of my favorite games was Red Light/Green Light. Our teacher would stand at one end of the classroom and either hold up a red stop sign or a green colored go sign. If she called out, “Green light!” we’d take steps toward her. If she said, “Red light!” we’d freeze in place. Although we could get our little bodies to stop and go on command, we couldn’t do the same with our giggles while we played!

Moses exemplified a prayer habit for us to follow when it comes to red lights, green lights, and all the travel we do in between. In Number 10 the Israelites were leaving Sinai for their first approach to the Promised Land. So they set out from the mountain of the LORD and traveled for three days. The ark of the covenant of the LORD went before them during those three days to find them a place to rest. The cloud of the LORD was over them by day when they set out from the camp. Whenever the ark set out [Green Light!], Moses said, “Rise up, O LORD! May your enemies be scattered; may your foes flee before you.” Whenever it came to rest [Red Light!], he said, “Return, O LORD, to the countless thousands of Israel” (Numbers 10:33-36).

Before Moses set out, he prayed. When he came to the end of the day’s journey, he prayed. What a great example for us to follow as we travel through life!

Psalm 121 is known as the Traveler’s Psalm. Missionary explorer, David Livingstone, read this Psalm when he worshiped with his father and sister before setting sail for Africa. One of my middle-school classmates said they never headed out on a summer vacation without her dad first reading this Psalm to their family.

It contains two important pray-all-the-time points for life’s journey.

Keep your eyes fixed on God all the time. I lift up my eyes to the hills – where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip – he who watches over you will not slumber; indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep (Psalm 121:1-4).

God’s eyes are on you all the time. The LORD watches over you – the LORD is your shade at your right hand; the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. The LORD will keep you from all harm – he will watch over your life; the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore (Psalm 121:5-8).

Prayer Step: 1. Before you set out, pray. 2. When you stop, pray. 3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 throughout your life’s journey.

Prayer is the first thing wherewith a righteous life beginneth, and the last wherewith it doth end.
Richard Hooker

Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop – a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown (Matthew 13:8).

At the GEMS Ladies’ Tea that our club hosted for the widow ladies in our community, the girls and senior saints earned the Flash Back! 50th Anniversary Badge. During the intergenerational Bible Study portion of the badge we studied the Parable of the Four Soils (Matthew 13:1-23). We identified the seed as God’s Word, and then talked through some of the reasons that God’s Word does not grow within us: lack of character, worry, busyness, greed, lack of trust, shallow faith, and the deceitfulness of wealth. These things choke God’s Word out of our hearts!

Rae Jean, the craft counselor for the 3rd/4th grade girls, then read Help Others Grow. It’s filled with prayer challenges: Pray that God will use you to tell His story – to tell others the story of what He has done in your life and what He can do in theirs. Pray that God will clearly guide you to people whose lives He wants you to help or change or touch in some way. Pray that you will hear and respond to the Holy Spirit as He guides you. And pray that the Holy Spirit will prepare in advance the hearts of those you will reach and touch and help.

As she read, she got choked up. The Word of God had not been choked out of her life. She and the rest of the counselor team have received the seed that fell on good soil. They heard the word and understood it (Matthew 13:23). Instead, she got choked up as she thought about the people who planted seeds in her life and the seeds she has planted and will continue to plant in the lives of others.

Our badge work took a new path as ladies and girls identified the people who had planted seeds in their hearts. Their answers included moms and dads, grandparents, teachers, GEMS Counselors, and more.

Whether you have a green thumb or struggle to keep plastic plants looking good, you’ve been a gardener of the King during the 2009-2010 GEMS season. When you taught the girls about prayer during Bible Study, or how to use their creative talents during craft time, carpooled, provided snacks, or served in a host of other ways that benefited the girls and counselors, seeds were planted and watered.

Like Paul reminded the church in Corinth, although we’ve been about the spiritual gardening of planting and watering seeds, it’s God who makes the seed grow (1 Corinthians 3:6). So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow (1 Corinthians 3:7, TNIV).

Prayer Step: Pray that the seeds you planted this season take root and produce a harvest beyond your wildest dreams.

The seed once sown grows . . . of itself, from its own impulse and power of life . . . The self-inherent power of growth of the kingdom of God.
Rudolph Stier

I’m a recovering perfectionist. To give you an idea of the exact scale of my malady: I cried the first time I got a B+ in college. We’re not talking a few tears, either. We’re talking I called my mom and sobbed because, as far as I could tell, the world was ending. The conversation went something like this:

Me: Gasp, sob, sniffle This is going to RUIN my final grade!
Mom: You know, sweetie, a B+ isn’t a bad grade, and it was just one test.
Me: Sniffle, sob But, gasp for air, sob what if I want gasp for air to sniffle go to sob grad school sniffle someday?
Mom: You want to go to grad school? Well, you know – it’s still your first semester; you’ve got lots of time! Did I mention a B+ isn’t a bad grade? And it was just one test!
Me: Gasp You sob just sob don’t gasp for air understand! Cue my meltdown into uncontrollable weeping.

Let’s just say it was a mildly horrific day for both of us – bless my mom’s heart.

So, anyway, as a recovering perfectionist, I’m learning to integrate the word messy into my vocabulary more and more. I’m systematic; I’m organized. I don’t like messy. But life is messy. And the more you dive in and really invest in people and relationships and emotions, the messier it can get.

And, whether it’s a broken relationship in my own life or gazing into the eyes of a neglected orphan in Africa, I’ve had lots of messy, B+ moments – moments when I’m starring down the barrel of something truly terrible or shocking, something far from perfect, on the brink of a meltdown, wondering how I could possibly make things right. And my instinct is to push back – to struggle and resist and fight to fix things.

And so I trudge through piles of pain and deceit up to my chin. I elbow my way through death and disease and jealousy and pride and hunger and hate – fighting for justice, fighting for order, and sometimes simply fighting to stay standing.

And it’s in those moments that I return to Exodus 14. I can sympathize with the Israelites. Things weren’t going the way they had planned. Pharaoh’s army was pursuing them. Things seemed hopeless. They wanted to go back to Egypt. They craved structure. They craved order.

Their solution? Cry about it to Moses. And, with a hint of maternal affection, Moses tells it like it is: “The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still” (Exodus 14:14).

Stop whining, he implored. Nothing you can do is going to make this better. You can’t make this right. But just watch. Be still. God’s already got it covered; let Him do the fighting. You need only to be still.

You need only to be still. I can do that. I can be still.

And it’s in the stillness that God gives His next command. It’s out of the stillness that God sets His saving acts into motion. I don’t need to fight, because I’ll never win on my own accord. But, in the midst of the messiness, I can be still. And I can listen. And then I can follow His lead. My effort alone will never be enough; I’ll never be perfect. But I follow the One who is – and He fights for me and makes a way. So I choose to be still. I choose to focus on Him and then watch the messiness and imperfection melt away.