Rein It In Part 2<\/p>\n\n\n\n
James 1:26 If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man\u2019s religion is worthless. 27 Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Why do I view this section as a probing exam? Partly, it\u2019s because James is clearly giving us a tangible guideline for comparison, and partly it\u2019s because Randy needs an exam. \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mark 7:14 Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, \u201cListen to me, everyone, and understand this. 15 Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n After a 24hr fast, meditating about this exam, I\u2019m happy to report that the Randy of today is an improvement over last year. This is good news, like saying \u201cWe just ran out of gas but the good news is that we\u2019re a hundred miles closer to the gas station than we were.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, what has improved? For starters: When I\u2019m full of myself and my big ideas it\u2019s easy to overlook those who literally need help through life\u2019s struggles. As a \u201creligious\u201d man, I can point out how others just don\u2019t measure up. But as my religion becomes less about what I think people ought to do or be and more about making their needs my needs I come closer to a true religion. Since committing to this devotional, I\u2019m definitely watching the rewiring of my brain. I can see how far I\u2019ve come AND how much farther I have to go. The more full I am of YHWH, the less room I have for staining by the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Father, thank You for testing us. Thank You for showing us what we lack. Thank you for filling us with Your Word and Your Love!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Rein It In Part 2 James 1:26 If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man\u2019s religion is worthless. 27 Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and… Continue reading Rein It In Part 2<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[86,93,92],"class_list":["post-181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devo","tag-james-126","tag-mark-714","tag-self-exam","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=181"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":182,"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181\/revisions\/182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sharp.men\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Come to think of it, I could save us all a lot of time in these devotionals by simply repeating \u201cMore of You and less of Me.\u201d Every single day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n