Found in Christ

"and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith." Philippians
3:9. This verse has an anointing on it. Paul says that he wants to achieve one thing in life; to be found and known in Christ. We need to also have this attitude. We can't always manifest perfect behaviour, but with God's help we can always reflect a perfect Saviour. We will never achieve good perfect behaviour, God won't let us, because we would then derive our sense of worth from our perfection and performance rather than from His love and grace. If we behaved perfectly all the time, would think God owed us an answer to all our prayers because of our obedience to all of the rules. Because of this, God leaves us with some weaknesses so that we have to go to Him and ask for His help and also depend on Him. God will not let us work our way into a sense of peace and fulfilment. But He will allow us to work ourselves into a frenzy! This is so that we will realise that works of the flesh produce nothing but misery and frustration. So what are we supposed to do? We can relax, enjoy life and learn to enjoy God more. We need to stop demanding perfection from ourselves and others and start enjoying everyone just as we all are. Basically, Paul said he wanted to be able to stand before God and say, 'Here I am Lord, in a big mess. I don't have any good works to offer you, but I do believe in Jesus.' We need to live like this every day or we will never enjoy peace and contentment. We can't enjoy life if everything is based on our good works. We must learn to acknowledge our dependence on God. "Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture." Psalm 37:3. There are 3 steps to dependence on God. First you need to learn what you are not. Accept the fact that success in your life does not come from your works. Instead you must trust God. "Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this" Psalm 37:5. The 2nd step to staying in a position of dependence on God is to learn who God is. "You were shown these things so that you might know that the Lord is God; besides Him there is no other." Deuteronomy 4:35. The 3rd step is to learn that as God is so are you. "In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgement, because in this world we are like him." 1 John
4:17. "He brought out of Israel, laden with silver and gold, and from among their tribes no one faltered." Psalms 105:37. When the Israelites came out of Egypt, they were a blessed people. They had seen the miracles of God and all the things He had done to Pharaoh on their behalf. Because the Lord was with them, they came out of the bondage with much of the Egyptians' material wealth, and with great physical health and stamina. But God wanted them to know that it was Him that brought them out, and not themselves. He wanted them to learn if they were to stay out of trouble, they had to keep depending on Him. "You may say you yourself, 'my power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me'." Deuteronomy 8:17. Not everything that comes into our lives is from God. But God will use the things of life, both good and bad, to teach us to depend on Him. If you truly want to live in peace and security then you must have this confident attitude in God. You must do your best and then leave the results to God. Allow the Lord to take from you all those earthly things from which you are trying so hard to derive a sense of confidence, worth, security and well being from. Let Him take them, He wants to, because He knows what is best.