Colossians 2:6-7
“As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.”
Successfully serving the LORD is no mistake. I will soon celebrate my 40th year of salvation. Throughout these years I have had my ups and downs as any Christian has, but by God’s grace I am still serving the LORD. The greatest joy of my life is knowing that I can walk with Christ every day.
If you are going to be successful in walking with Christ for the rest of your life, then you are going to have to do it on purpose. You won’t walk with Christ for the rest of your life by chance. There are purposeful steps you will need to take in your life if you want to walk with Christ until you go to Heaven.
First, you must be rooted in Christ if you are going to successfully walk with Him for the rest of your life. Just like a plant needs roots to stay alive, you need to root yourself in Christ to spiritually stay alive. I find that you need to dig your roots into a good church to successfully walk with Christ. A good church will help you get grounded in the faith. Walking with God in prayer and daily reading the Scriptures will also allow your spiritual roots to grow deep. This will allow your spiritual roots to grow deep so that you can avoid the heat of the world’s attacks.
Second, you must spiritually build yourself to successfully walk with Christ. The best way you can build your Christianity is by helping others grow. God says in Luke 6:38, “Give, and it shall be given unto you;…” I’ve learned that the more I build others, the more I must build myself. For instance, I get more out of my sermons than those who listen to me because I have to study to get the sermons. I rarely give everything in a sermon that the LORD gave me. As I give out to others, it spiritually builds me. Likewise, the more you involve yourself in helping others to spiritually grow, the more God will spiritually build you.
Third, you must be stablished to successfully walk with Christ. You need to know what you believe, for if you don’t you will eventually fail in your walk with Christ. It is imperative that you study the doctrines of the Scriptures so that you can be stablished in the faith.
Fourth, you must learn to be thankful if you are going to successfully walk with Christ. No matter what you face, you need to find something for which to be thankful. If you don’t find something to be thankful for in each situation you face, then you will grow bitter through the hard times and quit walking with Christ.
Finally, you must beware of anything that will pull you away from your walk with Christ. Watch out for false doctrine, bad attitudes, gossip, fleshly sin and wrong friends. Each of these things are capable of destroying your walk with Christ.
Your daily prayer to God should be to ask Him to help you successfully walk with Him. You won’t successfully walk with God by chance, if you succeed it will be because you did the aforementioned things on purpose. If you ever see one of these areas beginning to slip, quickly get back to it so that your walk with Christ can continue.