Serving with your Whole Heart: Day 5....

Deut. 30:11-20 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. [12] It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, "Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it?" [13] Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, "Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it?" [14] No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so that you may obey it.

[15] See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. [16] For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.

[17] But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, [18] I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.

[19] This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live [20] and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

You come across a passage like this a few times when you read through the Bible - the prophet's call for the people to be faithful to the word of God. And in it he lays down two futures - the prosperity and blessing of walking in God's path or the trouble that comes from walking outside his will.

I think for us when it comes to serving him with our whole hearts we too face this choice. If we leave the path we may find pleasure and enjoyment in the world's terms, we may even prosper materially. But if we do so, knowing that God wished and planned something else for us we will lack one thing, the peace of mind that comes from knowing that we are at the centre of God's will for our lives.

As I look back over the last few weeks of devotions I remember this, that I need to discover the way God has built me, find the task that he will give me, and run at it with my whole heart, so that I know I am at the centre of his will for my life.