Consecrated to Christ

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Consecrated to Christ

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Step one in being prepared for eternal life is to consecrate our life to God, and allow Him to do the spiritual work in our heart that needs to be accomplished. Our entire life is to be consecrated to God, through faith in the atonement of Christ, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

Consecrate means to dedicate or set aside for a specific and definite purpose. God said through Moses: Exodus 19:5-6 ”If you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’”

The Israelites confessed their sins, made a serious oath to separate from unbelievers, and promised to obey. Exodus 19:8,10 ”The people all responded together, ‘We will do everything the LORD has said.’ So Moses brought their answer back, And the LORD said to Moses, "Go to the people and consecrate [sanctify] them today and tomorrow.” God’s people dedicated their lives to Him, and promised to trust Him in believing faith without reservation or wavering, but in their own strength; and failed.

It is of great spiritual value to re-consecrate our life to God each day, and just as important to take spiritual inventory of our attitudes to evaluate whether our trust is truly on the atonement of Christ or not. Being consecrated is being committed to something—and in this matter, being committed to allowing God do whatever He pleases with our life.

Our life is consecrated to Christ so that we can claim the righteousness, the peace, the health, the healing, and the divine protection He purchased for us on the cross. The Holy Spirit was sent to live in us and take control of us, so we could learn spiritual lessons from God.

Every blessing God has for us—including His eternal kingdom—depends on consecrating our life to Him without any indecision, uncertainty, or compromise. We must understand God’s Truth and be willing to live it as He explained it in His Word. John 12:46 ”I a light to the world have come, that every one who is believing in me—in the darkness may not remain.” Anyone can be enlightened to God’s Truth by making a choice to know it.

The apostle Paul said to the governor Acts 24:15 “there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked.” Heaven is a prepared place for prepared people, and consecrating our life to Christ is the only way to have access and be ready for His return.

In closing his letter, the apostle wrote about believers being consecrated to Christ. He told them to 1 Thessalonians 5:21-23 ”Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. Abstain from all appearance of evil. And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Being consecrated to God means we are following His program for salvation—like traveling to another state, and being committed to go by way of the turnpike. If our life is consecrated to Christ, then we are trusting on His atonement sacrifice to forgive our sins, heal our body, protect from harm, and to provide our needs—all by faith.

A carpenter could not build a cabinet for us unless he had the wood; a tailor could not make a suit for us unless we give him the cloth; and a chef could not prepare a meal for us until he had the food. Many professing Christians expect God to take them to Heaven, but they have never given Him their life. Jesus said few would be willing so few are ready—Matthew 7:14 ”Because strait is the gate, and narrow [compressed] is the way, which leadeth to life, and few there are that find it.” Jesus said later Matthew 20:16 ”Many are called, but few chosen;”—many called to a life of faith, but few choose to live it.

Consecrated to Christ means we are willing to learn what God wants to teach us. When our life is given to Him, God begins to cleanse our heart of unrighteous thoughts, worldly attitudes, wrong decisions, and unbelief. Ezekiel 36:25 "Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.”

God needs to take the rebellious, unbelieving nature out of our heart, and install a submissive, believing nature in its place—but He cannot do that until He gets possession of it. The Potter must have the clay Jeremiah 18:3 ”So I went down to the potter’s house, and I saw him working at the wheel.”

The vessel was marred, but the master potter was able to take the pieces and form a vessel. 6 "O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter?" says the Lord. "Look, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel!”

When we consecrate our life to God, He begins to mold and change our attitude. Only God can do that work, so we must not keep our life from Him. Ephesians 2:10 ”For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.” We can be His workmanship only if we will consecrate our life to Him.

There is to be no thought of ever going back on that commitment. We are to give up the old way of the world and accept the new way of the Lord. Romans 12:1 ”I beseech [plead with] you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.”

The devil says that a consecrated life is difficult, but God supplies both the desire and the ability to walk by faith on His Word and promises—we just make the choice. God gives instructions in the New Testament, which are to be followed by the power of His Spirit in our new walk by faith. Like turning a switch and letting electricity do the work, we turn our life over to God—Who empowers us by His Spirit.

Sacrificing our life to God every day, enables our attitude to be acceptable to Him every minute. God takes control, when we give Him our life. Romans 12:2 ”Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind [changing the way you think], that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

We begin life with ideas and attitudes that are opposite to God’s ways and attitudes. There has to be a complete change of our way of thinking. The Potter takes the clay and makes something pleasing to Him. 1 Corinthians 15:47 ”The first man was of the earth, made of dust.”

As God took nothing and made a human soul, He can take our life and make a new heart—if we are willing to be nothing and to let Him have the material. ”If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” 2 Corinthians 5:17. The only thing that means anything is “a new creature” Galatians 6:15.

The devil pictures the Lord’s ways as unworkable. The reason so few consecrate their life to Christ, is because Satan says it is the hardest place, but being in the will of God is opposite to what the devil pictures it. God’s will is good, pleasing and perfect—not hard, difficult, and unpleasant. The only attitude to have is a willingness to trust God, through faith in His Son, by the power of His Spirit.

When we consecrate our life to God, He begins the process of changing our heart. Every angry word, every annoyed look, every difficult person, any insult, loss, or spiteful act will be a chisel in the hands of God to conform us—to the attitude Philippians 2:5 ”which was also in Christ Jesus.” If things are met in a scriptural way, there will be a change of attitude in our heart.

We are not to be upset about what people say to us, or how they treat us, because when anything touches our life, it has passed through God first. He allowed it, so He can use it—to mold our ways and to change our attitudes. We just make the choice, because Philippians 2:13 “God is working in you, giving you the desire to obey him and the power to do what pleases him.”

The apostles endured the worst of difficulties, but they learned spiritual lessons by trusting the Lord in faith—so that ”in everything glory may be given to God in the name of Jesus Christ, to whom belong the glory and the might [for ever and ever. Amen]” 1 Peter 4:11.

The apostle Paul said Philippians 2:14 ”Be ever on your guard against a grudging and contentious [complaining] spirit, so that you may always prove yourselves to be blameless and spotless—irreproachable children of God in the midst of a crooked and perverse [wicked; depraved; corrupt] generation, among whom you are seen as heavenly lights in the world, holding out to them a Message of Life.”

Any difficulty that is met according to the will of God becomes a vehicle of blessing—taking us to new heights of spiritual learning, to a better understanding of spiritual truth, and to a greater knowledge of God’s power. ”For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building” 1 Corinthians 3:9—if we will let Him have the materials.

Consecrating our life to Christ means God is our personal Teacher—Who is waiting to teach us every moment of every day. He wants to teach us what we need to know, so we should give Him our life without hesitation. He will do the spiritual work that needs to be done, if He has access to the materials. Everything that touches our life will change our attitude, because every difficult thing is a chisel in His hands to conform our ways to be His ways—our desires to be His desires.

Our prayer to God: I will no longer blame others, or complain about things, but I will praise You for the spiritual blessing I receive, when I meet things in Your way. As I meet every difficult circumstance and every difficult person as Your Word says to meet them, the result will be the richest of spiritual blessings from Your great heart of love—leading directly to Your kingdom. Amen.

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