Have you ever been off center when walking down the street? Maybe you were trying to avoid a mud puddle. Maybe you were trying to avoid a piece of gum in the street. Maybe you just lost your balance. If we are honest, it is has happened to all of us at some point. How do you regain your balance? By getting both of your feet back into a solid position that will support you. Recently, the Lord began to speak to me about this sort of thing where my spiritual life was concerned. My biggest issue is that I want to make people happy. When I do something, I want the person that I am doing the act for to be pleased. Nothing wrong with this at all. In fact, it is an honorable goal to shoot for in whatever we do. The problem for me has been motivation. I want people to be pleased with me so that they will like me. As such, this causes me to be a people pleaser at times. The biggest problem is that other people then have the control over my life instead of God. In dealing with this issue, God told me that He is my plum line. A plum line is something used by carpenters as a standard for building a project. The plum line is the center of the entire project. God wants to be our center. He wants to be the measurement by which we align our lives. So, what does this look like? It begins with motives. Am I doing what I am doing because it aligns with God’s perspective? Am I doing what I am doing because it aligns with the love of God? Am I doing what I am doing because it brings the peace of God to someone else? I tell you what when God showed me this a big weight lifted off my shoulders. I began to realize that I owe no man anything but to love them. Because God is love and He lives on the inside of me, I can love. I can love God. I can love you. I can love myself. This is the essence of true peace. A life yielded to the will of God. We live in a world that is self-centered by nature. In order not to conform to this world as the Bible tells us, we must go against the grain. This begins with a yieldedness to the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. God wants to be enough. He wants to be more than enough. When He becomes more than enough in our lives, we will not be jealous when others get that promotion. When He becomes more than enough in our lives, we will not need the approval of others because God Himself will fill that gap. Now, don’t misunderstand me. That does not mean that we are to become loners. We need fellowship with one another. But, at the end of the day, it is the peace of God that sustains us. Today, as I end this devotional, I pray that you are filled with this peace and that the plumb line of Jesus Christ becomes the center of your life.
