“For in him we live and move and have our being.”
Acts 17:28
A few years ago, I struggled through a long bout against double pneumonia. While I was in the hospital, the doctors set an oxygen tank beside my bed so I could breathe easier. Never did I appreciate oxygen so! Up until my illness, I inhaled and exhaled the stuff with hardly a thought. I took breathing for granted. But in the hospital, I discovered afresh how life sustaining oxygen truly is. It’s my body’s life and breath.
This is often the way we relate to Jesus, our true life and breath. Because we live, move, and have our being in Him, it is easy to take His life-sustaining grace for granted. We forget that apart from Him we can’t do a thing (John 15:5). Putting your Christian life on automatic pilot is the same thing as “walking in the flesh.” When we forget that we live, move, and have our being in Christ, our prayers become dull, witnessing becomes dry, our jobs become routine, and relationships sag under the weight of selfishness. What’s worse, our relationship to the Lord turns into a chore. The Lord seems to lose vitality, becoming a wooden icon in our hearts, and a mere measuring rod for our behavior. It all happens when we forget to inhale His life-giving Spirit on a moment-to-moment basis. It happens when we fail to see the God of grace as our very life and breath. It happens when we take our Savior for granted.
Nothing is more mechanical than when we attempt to live a supernatural life apart from God. This is why the apostle tells us in Romans 6:11 to “count yourselves…alive to God in Christ Jesus.” To “count” means to take a daily inventory, to consciously consider yourself “alive to God in Christ Jesus.” Pause often today, asking God for moment-by-moment grace.
Jesus, You are the Breath of Life. I ask Your Spirit to help me lean on You moment by moment today.
