Ruined by God's Love

Have you ever been ruined by God? It is an interesting question I know. And I'm sure many of you right now are scratching your heads and saying did she really just ask me if I've been ruined by God. Or you are thinking I have been healed by Him, redeemed by Him, restored by Him, filled by Him and sometimes I have been broken or humbled by Him, but never has God ruined me. I promise if you stick with by the time I am done writing today I will answer that question for you.

I had the pleasure of accompanying my friends Lauren and Keith to church yesterday. It was a very non-traditional service in the sense that the entire time was just spent praising and worshiping and fellowshiping and communing with God through music (something I could have done all day). The worship leader was explaining to us that this service had been in the works for many months and that as he was preparing for the day he spent a lot of time reading Romans, especially Romans 6. As he was preparing God inspired him with this song he was about to introduce to use and he presented us with the very same question I just presented you with.

Honestly to say I was shocked is an understatement. In my little religion major mind all sorts of bells and whistles and flags were going off. I just could not believe what this guy had just asked. My interest was also peaked though (probably because I was curious to see how this guy was going to talk his way out of this). But he began to read to us the scripture that God had inspired him with and I began to see where he was going. If you are not familiar with Romans 6 Paul is explaining that we have died with Christ and are given new life in Him. That we are dead to sin. That we are free from the bondage of sin and have become slaves to righteousness. I know that being a slave does not sound very appealing to anyone, but because we are slaves in one form or another to something why not be a slave to righteousness living for Christ.

So with that set up here is how we are ruined by God. As we die to sin and to our former selves we are bound as slaves of righteousness. We abdicate our place and control of our own lives and allow God to take the reins. His internal working of our heart, mind and soul begins to reflect in our outward and daily lives so much so that it begins to be less of ourselves who is seen and more of God. Thus by the standards and practices of the world living without God we have been ruined by His love and presence in our lives. So you see by allowing God's inner working and by becoming slaves to righteousness rather than slaves to this world we have become ruined by God's love (at least in the eyes of the world which is fine by me).