Dear Friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers in this world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. NIV
Friends, this world is not your home, so don’t make yourselves cozy in it. Don’t indulge your ego at the expense of your soul. Live an exemplary life among the natives so that your actions will refute their prejudices. Then they’ll be won over to God’s side and be there to join in the celebration when he arrives. TMSG
I love that word “cozy” used in the TMSG reading. It is so fitting for what I sense goes on in our lives in the body of Christ today. I think we have gotten “cozy”.
Another way to say that would be “comfortable”. We go to church, worship, get on our prayer lines, go to Bible studies, attend retreats, etc., and we are comfortable with our Christianity. The problem is that following Christ isn’t exactly something I would define as cozy/comfortable. Why?--because truly following Christ means living outside your cozy/comfortable zone. It means putting others first, sharing the Good News of the Gospel, allowing Him through the power of the Holy Spirit to root actions and behaviors out of us that are not in alignment with who we are as Children of God, extending forgiveness to those that have hurt us, and much, much more. It means dying to self! Nothing cozy about that feeling is there?
If you have gotten cozy/comfortable as a believer in this world…”Wake up, Sister!”
"If Christianity has never disturbed us, we have not yet learned what it is."
Sir William Temple (1628–1699)
His,
vickie
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