Christ as the Center

Lesson 29: Make Christ the center of your life.

I know I've written about this one several times in past blogs, but I feel it's necessary to dedicate a whole lesson to this theme.  This truly has been the focus of my summer and it will continue to be so for the rest of my life.

Making Christ the center of my life is my main goal.

Not the #1 priority (even thought that is important in some sense).

The center.

This summer I got the amazing opportunity to counsel kids from ages 7-18.  But no matter the age or maturity level, God always put it on my heart to teach them about making Him the center of their lives (while also teaching me how to do so in the process).  God doesn't want to be our #1 priority if we're just going to forget about Him in the other priorities that rule our lives.  Following God doesn't work like that.  We can't just check Him off on a nice little box and say, "Okay, I prayed, did my quiet time went to church, etc. and now I'm good."

God wants to be involved in our lives, not just be one little part of it.  God wants to be included in everything.  Your friendships.  Relationships.  Family.  Hobbies.  Everything!

So how does one make Christ their center?  God is still teaching me how to do that.  Part of the answer is obvious: Read your Bible, pray, fellowship, fill your thoughts with him.  As cheesy as that sounds, it's so true.  One thing God truly taught me this summer was that it truly doesn't matter how much time you spend privately with Him so long as you do it and still keep Him with you during the day.

I guess if I were really to sum up this whole lesson it would be this one word: Surrender.  To make Christ the center means to relinquish control and realize you can't do it on your own.  Surrender sometimes means giving up things that you like or are comfortable with.  But if that's what it takes to truly be content in the Lord and make Him the center, it's so worth it.

"Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: 'Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?'" ~Mark 8:34-37

With Lots of Love,

~Alyssa