No looking back

To live a life for Christ is a life where you don't look back. To me, it's living a life where you press on forward every single day. Nobody has lived a perfect life besides Jesus. We have all made mistakes, done and said things we shouldn't have, etc. There is no reason to ever look back at those things.

Yeah, we have all gone through a lot, but that doesn't matter in eternity does it? What matters is that we come to Christ and take up our cross daily.

Christ wants total dedication from us. It's time to be done with the excuses. Anything that is done with half-hearted commitment is not worth doing.

Whatever your priorities are on a daily basis, fully commit yourself to those things. Sometimes, you have to become disciplined in other areas of your life before you become disciplined in your relationship with Christ.

Let me say that again because I think it's important and encouraging. Sometimes, you have to become disciplined in other areas of your life before you become disciplined in your relationship with Christ.

God should always be your number one priority...don't get me wrong...but sometimes to build the relationship we long for with him, we learn from the habits we have built with some of our other priorities.

I would have never been this disciplined in my relationship with Christ if it wasn't for some of the injuries that I went through in basketball. Whenever I got hurt, the key to a speedy recovery was being disciplined with doing therapy before and after practice. Another basketball example is this...I wanted to be really good and the only reason I was good was because I outworked everyone. I worked out when nobody else wanted to, ran harder when nobody else wanted to, etc. I wasn't the most athletic or skilled, but my hard work and dedication got me where I wanted to go.

The discipline I learned from basketball lead to be having that sort of relationship with Christ.

Maybe that may be the way it is for you...whatever your number one priority in your life right now might lead you to a stronger relationship with Christ.

It's a fun way to think about it for those who are wondering what it takes to have that type of relationship with Christ.

Jesus replied, "No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God." (Luke 9:62)

When I read that verse the first thing I thought of it tubbing. One of my favorite things to do in the summer is go tubbing on the lake. It's crazy how many times the boat driver looks back to see if the tube is still back there and everyone is safe...

The silly thing is that we do this in our faith too. We are always looking back...why? Christ isn't going to leave us? He's not going to ever fail us? Why are we looking back when we know that we are going to have a relationship with him for all of eternity?

I don't really understand why we do that..

Jesus wants total dedication from us. We cannot pick and choose among Jesus' ideas and follow him selectively; we have to accept the cross along with the crown. We must be willing to abandon everything else that has given us security - without looking back.

With our focus on Jesus, we should allow nothing to distract us from following him.

I encourage you to not look back and to allow nothing to distract you. Have complete faith in what God is doing in your lives. Sometimes it might not make much sense, but I can assure you, he is at work, and is planning something more wonderful and spectacular for your life than you could ever imagine.