Total Commiment Part 2

There are things, even good things, which can distract us from having a total commitment to God. Jesus indicated that we are to love God more than family. Jesus gives us one of those hard sayings in Matthew 10:37 when He says,”He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. Sometimes we want to soften that down, not because we really love our family that much but family can be a great excuse and one that seems to be justified, to lessen our commitment to God. There are times though when it is absolutely true, our love for our family dictates how we will live for Jesus Christ.
Psalm 45:10-11 Listen, O daughter, consider and incline your ear. Forget your own people also, and your father's house; so the King will greatly desire your beauty because He is your Lord, worship Him. Oh how this speaks of the love relationship with God and His people. There is a call to forget our family (your father's house), forget your people (nationality, heritage, culture,) and speaks of a love for God that has first priority and separation from the world.
2 Corinthians 6:14-17 is a call to separation. It says, “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? 15And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? 16And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people."17Therefore "Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord.
Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you."
We are not to be unequally yoked with the unbeliever. That does not mean that we cannot have them as friends nor do things with them but it does mean that we separate ourselves from their sin. If they persist in that sin and that sin threatens our relationship with God than we will choose God before them. We do not have fellowship or communion with them any more if we are serious about walking with God in total commitment. Fellowship means participation or interaction. We are to longer to have participation or interaction with sinful activities. Take notice, that unless their hearts are changed they do not want to have any participation in your activities now, either. There is no harmony in a relationship when two people are going separate ways. Something has to give and if the believer gives in and becomes worldlier then tyhe unbeliever has no reason to change and becomes more hardened to the voice of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes there is a yielding of the unbeliever to tolerate “God” and the life of the believer but there is never true agreement. The only way there will be true agreement is for the unbeliever to yield to the Holy Spirit and become a believer. This verse says that we must come out from them. Total commitment requires separation from the unclean thing…not the person…but the sin that they hold on to which begins with the rejection of God. Many would say that they don’t reject God but they do reject His Lordship and claim on their lives. When it says not to “touch” the unclean thing it means that we are not to “attach” ourselves to those that have attached themselves to sin and sinful living. How can we say that we are total committed to God and compromise in our lifestyle for the sake of someone, any one else?
Total Commitment begins and ends with commitment to God and acknowledging his rightful claim to our life, all of it.
Deut. 6:5 (NKJV) You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
When we separate our hearts and minds from the things and the people of this world we come into a much easier place to love the Lord with all our heart, mind and strength. There must be a turning FROM the world as well as a TURNING TO God in order to love Him as we should and as we have been commanded.