Living Up to Your Full Potential

By Bonnie Ricks, This Day's Devotional Saturday, December 31, 2005

Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. Luke 1:3-4 (NIV)

Are you living up to your full potential as a Christian? Most of us aren't, you know. Because most of us haven't really studied our instruction manual.

Some time ago, I bought a new 4-in-one printer/fax/copier/scanner... one of those fancy models, with all the bells and whistles the manufacturer could dream up. The front of this incredible work of technology looks like it belongs in the cockpit of an airplane. >From the flier I read on the unit, my modern marvel can do most everything, short of cleaning the kitchen for me. And what did I do when I took it out of the box? I carefully hooked it up to my computer, making sure the cable was hooked into the right slot in the back of my PC tower and the power cord was plugged in. Then I made careful note of where the power button was, along with "copy", "scan", and the different buttons for color and black & white, plus where the icon is on the computer task bar to bring up the unit¡¯s controls on screen. I know I can put the memory card from my digital camera in it and print pictures straight from that if I want to, but I know just about as much about the camera as I do about my new multi-function printer/copier/scanner/fax machine! The instruction manuals for both are somewhere in a drawer. And my modern technological wonders do nothing more than I know how to tell them to do. They are not living up to their full potential, are they?

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You and I are like my new scanner/copier/printer/fax machine. We know how to recite John 3:16 and the 23rd Psalm. We know where to find a few things, like the Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, and we know Luke recounted a lot of Jesus' parables. And, of course, we all know 1 Corinthians 13 almost by heart. Some of us go even further, knowing the books of the Bible, and a good list of favorite stories, especially from the Old Testament. But that's about it. And most of our instruction manuals lay in a drawer or are gathering dust on our bedside tables or coffee tables, never opened except when we absolutely have to. Because of that, most of us are not living up to our full potential.

In China where Bibles are not allowed, when believers manage to get their hands on a Bible that¡¯s been smuggled illegally into their country, do you know what they do with it? They carefully tear it apart, page by page. Then they distributed those pages among the believers in their area. Each person memorizes his/her page front and back, and then secretly passes it along to the next person who does the same. Slowly, carefully, and secretly, those believers are memorizing God¡¯s Word, because it is so very, very precious to them. And they do it because they know that if they are caught with a Bible in their possession, they will definitely lose what little freedom they have, and very possibly lose their lives. So they are dedicated to ¡°write¡± God¡¯s Word on their minds and in their hearts, where no one can take it away from them.

Hard to imagine, isn¡¯t it? But it¡¯s true. So keep this in mind every moment of every day. And, because you are free to do so, brush the dust off your Bible and start reading God's instructions for living today. Read them from cover to cover. Study them as closely as you can. Let God open your eyes to the potential he has for you as one of His children. Start living up to your full potential today.

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates,¡¦ Deuteronomy 11:18-20 (NIV)

From Dogwood Ministries, Inc.
J-R-and-Bonnie@dogwoodministries.org