Day 3
Life Shapers (tipping points)
Dave Montgomery
Most of us have had experiences or events happen in our
lives that changed our lives forever, something that caused us to live our life
differently. They are called tipping
points. If you think back on your life,
you will be able to identify them.
As I reflect back, I can identify many tipping points that
changed the direction of my life.
Probably the most radical tipping point was at when I was 32 years old.
I though t I was a Christian, we attended church every
Sunday. Marge was involved in
church. I just attended.
The Church decided to have a Lay Witness Mission. That is when a group of lay people come to
the Church and give their testimonies about how God worked in their lives when
they accepted Him as Savior and allowed Him to be the Lord of their life.
I was reluctant to attend but my wife, who was on the
committee, convinced me to try it.
The first night
started with a dinner. After dinner,
some of the wittiness gave their testimony about how their lives had changed
when they had accepted Christ as their savior and allowed Him to be the Lord of
their lives. The testimony of one man in
particular spoke to me. His life, before
he turned it over to the Lord, was just like mine. He had accepted Christ and been baptized when
he was 13 years old. After that, he attended
church but never got overly involved. He
was a Christian, he looked like one, he talked like one but actually, it had
little effect on his everyday life.
After he allowed God to be the Lord of his life, his whole
life changed. God began to transform
him. He had a greater appreciation and
understanding of what Christ had done for him, the bible seemed to come alive
and he understood what he was reading, his marriage improved, and his
relationship with his children was better.
That man’s testimony convinced me to participate in the rest of the
weekends events.
The
last event was Sunday morning and they ended the service with an alter
call. I was reluctant to go forward but
I saw a friend of mine that I thought was a committed Christian go and I thought “if she needs to let go and let God”
then I do too. So I went too and prayed,” Lord, I don’t know what you want to do in my
life but here I am, be the Lord of my life”.
That was a major “tipping point” in my life. God began a transformation that continues to
this day. I would like to tell you that
I immediately transformed into a mature Christian but that is not what happened. It is a lifelong process that continues day
by day. We will never reach perfection
in this life but we must continue to work toward it.
We need a plan that keeps us heading toward the vision God
has for our life. We need to reflect on
our life up to this point and discover the things that have shaped us into the
person we are. Why do we do what we
do? It helps us understand what causes
us to react in a certain way. What
things have shaped your life? Do you
need to change some things in your life, as I had to? All tipping points are not good. Sometimes we have had things happen in our
life that cause us to react to things in a negative way. God will expose those things and give us the
ability to overcome them if we are obedient to His leading.
Set up an “Upward Training” plan today, one that will
continue to lead you to spiritual maturity.
Can you identify some key tipping
points in your life?
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Think about your current
circumstances. How could some of them
become tipping points?
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Prayer: Reflecting specifically
on this devotional, write out a prayer to God.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
No comments:
Post a Comment