April 9

Step 4: We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

April 9

Read: Romans 6

A quick read through Romans 6 may evoke a wide range of emotions. …we should no longer be slaves to sin…wow! That sounds great. Since sin is living independently of God, and because we’ve presumably been ready to acknowledge the first three steps as true (Why else would we be at step 4? If you’ve not done that yet, stop now. Return to step one. You’re wasting your time.), that usually means we’ve come to accept the fact that independent living has not served us well.

…we should no longer be slaves to sin rings like an answer to prayer. Our plaguing hurts, habits and hang-ups can be wiped out? Cool!

But suppose you’ve been at this believing thing for awhile, and some of your hurts, habits and hang-ups haven’t cooperated by fleeing at the mere mention of your bold believing. Does Romans 6 leave you wondering what you’re doing wrong?

…in the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God. Huh? How do you do that? I recommend you start with an inventory. I believe that you have to count, take stock, pay attention to, re-evaluate your life in order to make a wise decision about what to ask God to kill off and what to nurture.

So be brave. Start with bitterness. Ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to you where bitterness has taken root in your heart. (For a bit of a description of bitterness and it’s ugly effects, see Step 4, Day 7 of this devotional series.) Grab a dictionary and study the definition. Ask the Holy Spirit where the tender wounds are in your heart that have festered into bitterness. Then just write it down. Don’t filter it, judge it, debunk it, ignore it. Try hard not to medicate it with chocolate and peanut butter. Just write it down.

Thought for today: If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin – because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Selected passages, Romans 6

Thought for tomorrow: I realize that right now you are thinking about how I’m trying to trick you into doing an inventory. You’re wrong. I’m making no bones about it – just do it. Why? Because it’s good for you. Medicating, avoiding, denying, repressing, suppressing all our hurts, habits, and hang-ups equals letting sin reign in our mortal body so that we obey its evil desires. If you continue in this manner, God won’t stop loving you. Your stubbornness won’t cause Jesus to renounce his crucifixion and subsequent resurrection experience because he’s irritated by your bad behaving. What it will do is hinder you from experiencing the capacity to be free that was given to you the very moment you allowed Christ care and control of your life, believing that only He could restore you to sanity.

April 9
Teresa McBean