30-Day Personal Devotion Challenge Day 17

Good Morning Church Family – Day 17

Read Colossians 3:5-10

Devo Thought: My first job was at a “mom and pop” hardware store. I started working there when I was 15. I had a bunch of different responsibilities there. I had to stock shelves and help customers. I learned to measure and cut chain and PVC pipes and thread plumbing pipes. I cut keys and rented out equipment. I worked with my hands and sometimes got pretty dirty. The worst days though were the days that the concrete got delivered. We sold 40, 80, and 100lb bags of concrete, and because I was the youngest employee, I was tasked with unloading the bags when deliveries were made to the store. Especially in the summer months, this meant a lot of sweat and grim. The concrete would stick to my arms and neck as I toted the bags on my shoulders. It also ended up all over my shirt and jeans and tennis shoes. I was covered in it. I was filthy. One of the best feelings was going home on those days, getting out of those dirty clothes, showering all that grim, and putting on new clothes. It would have been a strange thing for me to have taken off all those dirty clothes, washed off all that grim, and then put back on those dirty clothes. This is exactly what Paul is getting at in today’s passage. We had been living in all this filth and dirt (“anger, wrath, malice, slander, obscene talk, lies”), but Jesus cleansed us from all that. Now, it’s time to put on new clothes. Paul makes it clear here that it isn’t acceptable for us to go back to the old way (the old self). We must move forward and put on a new way. Put to death the old way (burn those old dirty clothes) and put on the life of Jesus.

Prayer – Let us ask God to help us identify old ways of living in us and then to put off those ways and put on the ways He has for us.