Christ is My Life
A One Year Devotional Encouraging spiritual growth to be authentic, Spirit-led, and Christ-centered
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Everyone wants the best that this life on earth has to offer. Many elements can affect our quality of life, such as our heritage, environment, experiences and choices. Their impact will be determined by the path we choose based on the cards we’re dealt.
We can choose to follow our own way, make our own decisions, and live in our own strength, or we can admit that we are insufficient in ourselves and ask for God’s help.
Living in relationship with God through Jesus Christ His Son as Savior and as Lord will cause His love, grace, faith and power to lift us above any hindrances and limitations of our natural circumstances and catapult us into unimagined peace, rest and success.
Make Christ your life; learn of Him and live your best life ever!
February 25
Grace Not Effort — Day 2
“And of his fullness have all we received, and grace for grace.” —John 1:16
Truth: Grace is what God did through Jesus. Faith is how we respond once we have heard. We have faith when we believe. God’s gift of salvation did not require our obedience, goodness, any acts of service, works, or our performance, only our belief and response. See Romans 4:16; Ephesians 2:8-9.
When we humble ourselves and accept our great need for Jesus by faith, we are acknowledging His grace that we did nothing, that we expended no effort for our salvation. No amount of religion, good works, self-effort, church activity, or attendance, membership to the right church, no trying hard enough to do more, not to sin, or to obey the rules is acceptable to God. This is what religion is about, our efforts towards God for salvation and sanctification without the power of the Cross and the Holy Spirit.
Religion dishonors God because it rejects or minimizes His grace in Jesus and His work in us. The posture of dependence for salvation grace through faith honors God for all He did for us through Jesus, and we gladly accept Him and worship Him. Grace cannot be earned, only received.
Humble yourself and receive God’s grace because you did nothing to gain your salvation, and you cannot by yourself keep it. It is the life of Christ Jesus by His Spirit that will save and sustain you.
“I am the vine, and ye are the branches; He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me you can do nothing” (John 15: 5). However, with faith in God’s grace, we can do all things as our connection to Christ Jesus releases His grace, His power, and His life to us.
Life: Meditate on these Scriptures on God’s grace as you learn to depend on Him and make Christ your life. See John 1:17; Acts 20:24; Romans 4:16; 5:20; 11:6; 2 Corinthians 4:15; 8:7; 12:9; Ephesians 1:7; 2:8; 4:7; Colossians 1:6; 4:6; James 4:6-7; 2 Timothy 1:9; 1 Peter 4:10.
April 5
Christ Is My Life
“He restoreth my soul.” —Psalm 23:3
Truth: God through Jesus is in the restoration and reconciliation business. He can take what is dead, broken, stagnant, lifeless, and impossible in your life and bring restoration. In Ezekiel 37, the Lord was with the prophet and took him to the valley of dry bones, where he saw only death and degradation surrounding him. The Lord caused him to walk around in the valley to see the hopelessness and lifelessness, what seems like only death and the end of all things. But God did not allow him to despair.
God spoke and told him to prophesy and speak life to those dry bones. Ezekiel obeyed, and “there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone…the sinews and flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above… and the breath came upon them, and they lived and stood upon their feet” See Ezekiel 37:4-10.
Let us spend time with Jesus in a relationship, fellowship, and worship; look to Him and hear His Word to us. Listen and obey. Jesus is our perfection; as we believe His Word by faith, prophesy, and speak the Word given to us, He will perfect that seemingly hopeless situation concerning us and let the Word of life in Christ Jesus bring restoration and new life.
God came to earth in the flesh as Jesus to walk among us, to show us how to live in His eternal life of power. Jesus lived in perfect obedience to God the Father, and He brought life to the world. In this demonstration with Ezekiel, God shows us how to yoke with Him through Jesus in love and obedience, hear, speak His Word in faith, and let Him by His Spirit bring life to us just as He did the dry bones.
Life: Christ’s life in you will change death to life, sickness to health, darkness to light, torment to peace, fear to faith in His love and care, a spirit of heaviness to joy and defeat to victory. Christ is the actual reality of your life. Choose Him, relax and let Him work on your behalf.
Meditate on Ezekiel 36:26-28; John 1:4; 5:24, 26; Acts 17:28; 1 John 5:11-12.
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Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear… (Colossians 3: 2-4).
It is not enough to keep asking Jesus for His strength, peace, provision, and joy when God gave us the kingdom in Christ Jesus. When we align our hearts in an affectionate relationship with God by the power of the Cross, the Word, and the Holy Spirit, we will experience God’s grace in His love, goodness, mercy, and power.
Let the church arise casting off the limitations of self-effort in natural living. Instead let us choose to live the true supernatural gospel in full surrender, giving Jesus our all, in loving trust to experience His eternal life.
Christ is my life devotional, is designed to ground you in the fundamental teachings of Christ from the Word of God to challenge you into a deeper, intimate, and loving relationship with the Father by the Holy Spirit. He is our teacher of the gospel in Christianity, and without Him, we are left powerless with legalism and religion.
“And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3).
Get into a relationship and let the Holy Spirit lead you into becoming a more grounded and mature Christian anchored in love, faith, grace, and truth until indeed Christ is your life.
About the Author
Patricia Maragh is a graduate of Rhema Bible College Pastoral ministry. She has written two other books and passionately teaches the gospel of God’s grace through faith, encouraging people into salvation and spiritual maturity. She loves to learn as well as connect with family and all people. She is married with three grown children. She and her husband now reside in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Contact information:
GospelDeliveranceMinistries.org