Day By Day

In my pursuit of God, I search for Holiness. Because of my neurosis, I live my life in the fear of falling apart. I live my life in a constant state of unease and worry. I am constantly worrying that my failures are going to keep me from Heaven.

I do continue to wrestle with whether I think perfection is attainable in this life. Jesus called the woman caught in adultery to “Go and sin no more.” Why would he call her to that if it was an impossible goal? He didn’t say, “Okay, go, try your hardest not to sin anymore!”

The early church fathers also believed that it was possible to not sin. The earliest Christian works are ripe with calls to perfection. They believed that after baptism, people would stop sinning.

Let’s be honest, it is much easier to be a Christian when we don’t believe that we have to be perfect. Is this why we have such a difficulty with Christian Perfection?

And you can see why I am crippled with fear. I don’t understand.

Here’s what I do understand. I am fully aware of the fact that I am supposed to give everything I have to God. I’ve always made these commitments to God. The most popular one for me is, “I’ll commit to reading my Bible every day for the rest of my life!”

I’m so sincere. I really want to read my Bible and practice intimacy with God. But I always fail.

Seriously, I have yet to make it through that commitment.

So, what’s my problem? Am I not holy enough? Am I not perfect enough? Have I not been Entirely Sanctified?

Perhaps it’s a daily commitment to God.

Lord, I commit to practicing intimacy with you, today.

Tomorrow, I’ll make a similar commitment.

Is that what holiness is?

Maybe they were right when they said that the three things to pray daily were to see God more clearly, to love God more dearly and to follow Him more nearly. Perhaps that’s true holiness, doing it each and every day.

These three things, I do pray, day-by-day.