Day 1 of A Call to Die

Then Jesus said to His disciples: If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take on his cross and follow me.
Mathew 16:24

Today is the first day of my new bible study. I'm using a book title A Call to Die by David Nasser. Like I mentioned in a previous post, when doing this devotion you must sacrifice something. The point of A Call to Die is exactly what Mathew 16:24 is saying. We must give up our selfishness, deny ourselves the things that are dragging us away from God, and take up our crosses. I struggled with understanding completely what taking up our crosses meant. I believe it is denying the things that make you selfish, the things that are snatching away the time you should be spending with Christ. To some degree, I think it is carrying around your burdens, and as you go through life, realize how they are holding you down, and chip away at them little by little, eventually becoming selfless and dedicated to God. This would take an entire lifetime. Actually, it would be next to impossible to succeed at, selfishness is a normal part of one's, well, self. Few people have done it, say, Jesus for example. The goal of this study is to take the time that you spend doing other, seemingly pointless things, and dedicate that time to God. I am giving up texting, talking on the phone after 10 o'clock, and going online. I'm making Blogger the only exception because I am going to blog about my devotions. I have a feeling this is going to be a tough 40 days. Probably a great struggle for me, because I am constantly texting, or calling people, or surfing Facebook. (My mother can attest to this.) Thankfully, I have good accountability partners that will keep me in line. That, and, I really want this. I want to spend more time with God. To be able to feel him all around me, in little, tiny expressions of his immense love for us. I see these every day, but I want my eyes to be opened even further. One of the questions in today's devotion was What are the 3 most selfish things you do on a regular basis. The first thing I thought of was my brother's, especially my youngest one, David. He asks me to play with him alllllll the time. Go outside, jump on the trampoline, watch him do this thing on this game, little stuff. Most of the time, I don't do it. I say I'm too busy, or I just want to finish this chapter, or no, I just did my hair, I'll get sweaty! Always in the back of my mind there is the voice saying, "Go! Your his big sister, he needs you to play with him. This is how you can show your love to him. He needs it." But I ignore it, and dive back into my own selfish desires. I am going to stop this. I want to go up to David and say, "Hey, lets go play!" I will strengthen my relationship with both of my brothers, just by doing something as simple as watching them do a skateboard trick, and hopefully they will see my love for them as well as God's love for them through that. My first day of bible study was great, I've got 39 more days to go!