Living a Christ-Centered Life

What if living a Christ-centered life could radically transform your daily existence? On this episode of Faithfullyliven we explore three transformative ways to embody your faith every day: building a firm foundation, loving others, and bringing glory to God. I’m your host, Dwan, inviting you on a journey to not just understand but experience what it truly means to be a faithful follower of Christ.

Do you want to learn how to study the Bible? Check out the YouTube channel Faithfullyliven youtube.com/@faithfullyliven

Do you want to read about how to live faithfully? Check out the blog http://lyfe102.org

Get a free Road Map to get started learning how to study the Bible https://mailchi.mp/88f9c9405da0/bible-study-road-map

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:04

Welcome to Faithfully Living, the podcast where we learn how to live for Christ in our daily lives.

Speaker 1: 0:11

I'm Dwan, your host, and I would like to invite you on a journey with me to explore and learn how to be a faithful follower of Christ. Hey, everyone, welcome to Faithfully Living, the Podcast, where we strive to live for Christ faithfully by offering guidance on how to study the Bible, how to understand the Bible better and how to remain faithful to historic Christianity in a contemporary society. So in this episode I thought I would talk about how to live faithfully for Christ. So that's the whole essence of this podcast that I have to help you learn how to study the Bible, understand it better and remain faithful to historic Christianity.

Speaker 1: 1:07

So how can we remain faithful and live faithfully for Christ in our daily lives? So when we surrender our life to God and believe in the saving grace of Christ's sacrifice for us on the cross, we are called to to live a new life. We were to turn back from our old life that we had and turn to christ and become something new. In second corinthians 5, 17, it says this is from the ESV version. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old is passed away. Behold, the new has come. So we're called to. We're called to live, transform. Transform lives different than the one that we had before we surrendered our life to Christ. So how can we live faithfully for Christ in our daily lives? And I'm just going to touch on just three ways on how we can live faithfully. There are more ways I'm sure I can think of, but I just want to touch on these three Building a firm foundation of faith, loving others and then, lastly, bringing glory to God.

Speaker 1: 2:39

All right, so what does it mean to build a foundation of faith? So I'm going to give this quote by Sally Lord Jones. It says now some people think the Bible is a book of rules telling you what you should and shouldn't do. The Bible certainly does have some rules in it. They show you how to live, how life works best, but the Bible isn't about you and what you should be doing. It's about God and what he has done.

Speaker 1: 3:11

So I think we have to remember that, to build a foundation of faith, that we should learn and know more about God. And how we do that is by studying and reading the Bible. And when we study and read the Bible, we should try to understand it and knowing that the Bible isn't about us. It's about God and who he is. And when we read the Bible we'll learn more and more about you know, like I said, about God, in 2 Timothy 3, 6-7, it says All scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness that the man of God might be complete, equipped for every good work.

Speaker 1: 4:03

So when we strive to build a foundation of faith, it's going to help us in times when things don't go so well. So you know, as Christians and just people in general, we're going to go through tough times in our lives and it is only by God's grace and mercy who is going to see us through those tough times. So when we build a foundation of knowing who God is and studying and understanding his word, we learn about the character of God and who he is. So when we learn about that, we can get through our trials because we know who God is and his character, we know that he doesn't change, he's good, he's merciful, and when we go through difficult times, we know that he is going to be with us and that builds our faith as we see God work in our lives and then also in the lives of those who are around us. So the Bible, it molds and shapes us to be more and more like Christ. The Bible is our truth because God is truth and we have faith in the character of God when we learn more and more about the Bible. So, you know, when we read the Bible, it is well, a lot of the Old Testament is full of narratives of showing how God worked in the lives of people in the Bible. So the Bible is going to kind of like be our sword to combat the situations that we're going to, that we're going to face in life.

Speaker 1: 5:54

I know, always, when you know I'm going through a difficult time, or you know I tend to, you know, listen to my emotions more than I listen to what I know is true in my head, I find it always helpful to read Psalms because, you know, david wrote Psalms and it's filled with all of the emotions and the struggles and tools that David went through, and tools that David went through it has where he's, you know, talking about his fears, maybe his lack of faith, the things that we, you know, feel our emotions. We can't let our emotions and our feelings lead us on how we are to live. We're supposed to, you know, lead and follow what is true, but it's not wrong to have emotions and feelings. We can acknowledge those, but then we have to go back and redirect to what we know is true in God's word. So if you're ever, you know, feeling depressed or angry, go and read Psalms. I've always found it incredibly helpful, especially, you know, if I'm going through a time where I am doubting god and are fearful.

Speaker 1: 7:16

Usually and I'm not saying this is kind of like a magic eight ball or anything like that usually I will read the psalm that is correlating with the date of the day. So say, for instance, it is, you know, july 1st I would read psalms, psalms one, and usually when that happens, whatever, whatever that that chapter has to say, it usually kind of correlates to what I'm dealing with in. You know, in that moment when I go to read the Psalms, I'm not saying that's that all it happens all the time, but it's happened so many times where I just keep going back to the Psalms to, you know, help sort out the things that I feel and help me, to help give me reassurance of knowing that I can trust God and his character All right. So the next thing we can do to live faithfully for Christ is to love others. So a part of living our faith is applying what we read and study in God's word, and Jesus tells us the greatest commandments.

Speaker 1: 8:47

He said in Matthew 22, 36-40,. I'll read it. It says, teacher, which is the great commandment in the law. And he said to him you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment, and a second is like it you should love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend on the law and the prophets. So we are first to love God, first and foremost, but then we're also called to to love others. You know, this is, this can be, this can be hard, you know, because a lot of times we as people, as humans, can be unlovable. Ourselves can be unlovable and then the people around us can be. So. One thing we have to always remember that Christ loved us in our sin and died for us before we learned to love him. So if Christ could love us before we loved him, how much more can we extend that love to, you know, the people around us. People around us, paul, in his letter to the Corinthian church in 13, tells us how we are to to love one another. And this is just an excerpt.

Speaker 1: 10:13

So first Corinthians, 13, 4 through 7, says love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast, it is not arrogant or rude, it does not insist on its own way, it is not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices with truth. Love bears all things, believe all things, hopes all things, endures all things. So that kind of gives us a sense of what love is. You know, love is being patient, is being kind, but it's also willing to tell people the truth. You know you don't want someone to continue down a wrong pathway and end up in things that are not good and healthy for them. We're called to, you know, tell them in love and do our best to. You know, try to steer them in the right place if they're, if they're, willing to listen.

Speaker 1: 11:17

So loving others is is one way that we can remain faithful to, to living for Christ in our, in our life, and then kind of what's correlating to loving others is loving our enemies. So this is very difficult to do. I must say that I don't always love my enemies, which you know. Sometimes it's easier to love people who are easy to love. But is what God calls us to do? In Matthew 5, 43 through 44, it says you have heard that has been said you should love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be the sons of your Father, who is in heaven, for he makes the sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what I say hasn't done you wrong or you know, hasn't, like I say, hasn't done you wrong.

Speaker 1: 12:48

It's harder to love those people who are unlovable or have spiteful views. You are not treated too right, but God calls us to love those who, who you know are not necessarily, you know, our friends and we like them, so it's, it's something that we have to, you know, pray about and learn and ask God to. You know, turn our hearts to love those who we don't necessarily always think we should love. You know, it's only through Christ's love that we have to remember, like I said earlier, that Christ died for us when we were in our sins, before we learned to love him. So how much more are we? We know Christ is perfect, so we're definitely not perfect. So it's important for us to remember that we were loved even before we were enemies of God, so he loved us as an enemy. We also should love those who are our enemies, also Doing good to others.

Speaker 1: 14:19

Alright, so the last Point I wanted to make About living faithfully for God Is to bring glory to God. So, as believers, our ultimate purpose is to glorify God in everything we do. When, like I started before, that, when we surrender our life to God, we are no longer to be self-centered, it's not about us anymore, it's about God and it's about others. And the most important thing, like I say, the first and greatest commandment is to love God. So to love God is to bring him glory in everything we do. So our lives are not our own, it's not about our enjoyment, our joy, our health. It's about always bringing glory to God. So, as believers, we have a purpose to serve God and then serve one another. So when we gave our lives to Christ and believed in his name, like I said, we became a new person with a new life and we gave up serving ourselves. So we're no longer, like I said, to be self-absorbed. We're to live our lives for God and to serve him by loving him first and then loving our neighbor, and this is going to bring glory to God. First, corinthians 10, 31 says so, whichever. So whichever you eat or drink or whatever you do, do, all to the glory of God.

Speaker 1: 16:04

So we should strive in you know, our everyday lives, when we wait, from the time we wake up to the time we go to bed, how are we being a witness for Christ that glorifies him? You know we should strive to be a reflection of Christ. We are called to do good works that glorify God's name, and you know we're not going to always get it right, because we're still sinners, we live in a fallen world. But we can strive, through the power and strength of God that's in us, the Holy Spirit that dwells within us, to do good and to live for god faithfully. So we need to strive to do our best to bring glory to god in everything we do. I think it should be a prayer of ours each day that we will do our best to bring honor and glory to God. I know that's like I say we're not perfect, we're going to make mistakes, we're going to fall short until either we go to heaven or Christ comes back. But we should strive in our everyday lives to do our best to bring glory to God and then, when that doesn't happen, you know, repent and begin again striving to give glory to All right.

Speaker 1: 17:44

So I hope this episode kind of helped you understand how to live faithfully for Christ in our daily lives. I'm pretty sure I'll do another episode on some ways on how we can live faithfully for Christ in our lives. So that wraps up our episode. Our in our lives. So that wraps up our episode. So until next time, remember that god is always good and he's always faithful. Thank you for listening to the podcast. Do me a favor by following the podcast and leaving a review to help spread the word. I look forward to hearing from you.