There is one characteristic of a man or a woman of God that brings all characteristics together and that is to be faithful to God. To be faithful to God means that we trust Him; to be faithful to God means that we obey Him and to obey God means that we love Him (John 14:15). To be faithful to God means to learn to die to self; that is because, being faithful to God does not mean doing the same thing year after year; being faithful to God is doing what He tells us to do faithfully.

            If I consider that God’s ways are higher and different than ours (Isaiah 55:8-9) we most also conclude that to be faithful to God forces us to deal with one little scary thing called, “Change”. There is no way to be faithful to God and remain in our comfortable zone… absolutely no way! The Bible tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6).

            As we look at Abraham having to leave his hometown and his people; as we look at Moses wondering in the desert for forty years; as I see the children of Israel fighting giants to conquer the promise land and, as I look at the Old Testament prophets risking their lives every time they spoke God’s truth, I realize, very quickly, than being faithful to God will always take us out of our comfortable zone. The same can be said about the New Testament characters. John the Baptize was decapitated six months after he started his ministry announcing the coming of the Lord. All of the original disciples were murdered with the exception of John. Don’t think for a minute John got it easy, they did tried to kill him, he did suffer persecution, but most of all, the pain of seen all of his friends dying. The Apostle Paul was also decapitated.

            When I look at how comfortable many of our lives are as Christians I wonder, what are we doing wrong? We want the glory, but we don’t want to change; we want the anointing, but without having to leave our neighborhoods and our jobs. In other words, folks refuse to let go of their identity, that place where everybody knows you, where you have a degree of expertise and where you are comfortable. Very few are willing to “start all over”; they just want to continue the status quo. I am sure when they die, somebody will call them faithful for working in the same place for 20 or 30 years; my question is, did God called them to do the same thing for 20 or 30 years? I am not too sure!

            Matthew 7:21 tells us  “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.” It seems like we take God’s will very lightly. I remember hearing a deacon in a church stating that God follow us and bless us as we do our thing. In other words it is God following us and not us following Him? I confronted this deacon with his stupidity, but I wonder how many even noticed the heresy of his statement.

            Jesus is not only our Saviour He is also our Lord. He becomes truly our Lord when we surrender our will to his. We can’t say that He is our Lord when in reality we exclusively follow our will. There are some special words from our Father that are only reserved for a very prestige group. These words are not reserve for those who call themselves Christians, but for those who were faithful in doing God’s will. We see those words in Matthew 5:23, “…Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.” Matthew 5:23 (NASB) On the other hand, for those who were unfaithful to God and follow their own will and ways, they will hear a different set of words, “…I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.” Matthew 7:23 (NASB) Are you doing your own thing? Beloved to do our own thing is to practice lawlessness.