Take My Life

I have to say, I love the lyrics to hymns. These hymnal writers were so inspired by God and His love that they penned such heartfelt lyrics of praises to God, of sacrifice, and of self-denunciation. Some hymns that I have sung many times before take on a deeper meaning when I simply pay attention to the lyrics.

Not only do I appreciate hymns for their substance, but also for these writers who used their talents to bring honor to God and allowed God to use them to reach others.

We may say to ourselves, “Well of course they used their talents for God. Why wouldn’t they? Don’t all Christians want to do that?”

But it is so easy to be satisfied with ourselves and our talents and skills that we forget to use them for God. We take our eyes off of Him and only begin to focus on how far we can get in this life (how much money we can make, how many subscribers or followers we can get, how we can advance in our careers, etc).

So even though we may say we want to use our talents for God, many of us find ourselves not doing that.

The world is filled with people putting the focus on themselves and wanting everything to go their way all the time.

And it gets so annoying.

Selfishness is so easy to get wrapped up in.

A lot of us find it so easy to think we are better than anyone and everyone else. Or that our needs take priority over others’ needs. Or that our talents are better than theirs.

A lot of us spend so much time focusing on ourselves and our own gains in life.

And this may actually happen quite a bit, maybe even more than many of us would like to admit.

But not one of us is better than anyone else.

And there is so much more to focus on than just ourselves.

There is only one true Being who can be called good, and He came down from heaven to help us and save us and guide us and love us.

Wow. And we have the nerve to make everything about ourselves?

I get tired of seeing selfishness in myself. I get tired of seeing selfishness in others.

But boy, when we think about Jesus and turn our eyes upon Him, the less we feel like exalting ourselves and the more we truly want to use all of our talents to bring others to Him.

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Now on to the next part of this post: Trusting God with every aspect of our lives.

Lately the topic of trusting God (or feeling like there’s a lack of trust in God) has been brought up in some of my discussion circles. People are afraid. And because they are afraid, they let fear control their decisions, their actions, and their words.

And because they are afraid and are controlled by that fear, they feel they are not fully trusting in God.

Someone in one of these discussion groups mentioned how important it is to take certain risks in order to grow spiritually.

This made me think of how many of us may have been (or are) holding back something from God because we were (or are) too afraid of taking these necessary risks.

We are too afraid of external circumstances, or the “what ifs.”

What would happen if we just trusted God? Not in a presumptuous way, but in a truly faithful and consecrated way. In a “God, I really want to grow in my walk with You. I want to be used by You to show others Your love. I want to trust You through every season in my life,” kind of way.

What would happen if we took those risks, or stopped holding back, or stopped worrying or being afraid all of the time?

I love the lyrics to this hymn by Frances Ridley Havergal:

1 Take my life and let it be
consecrated, Lord, to thee.
Take my moments and my days;
let them flow in endless praise,
let them flow in endless praise.

2 Take my hands and let them move
at the impulse of thy love.
Take my feet and let them be
swift and beautiful for thee,
swift and beautiful for thee.

3 Take my voice and let me sing
always, only, for my King.
Take my lips and let them be
filled with messages from thee,
filled with messages from thee.

4 Take my silver and my gold;
not a mite would I withhold.
Take my intellect and use
every power as thou shalt choose,
every power as thou shalt choose.

5 Take my will and make it thine;
it shall be no longer mine.
Take my heart it is thine own;
it shall be thy royal throne,
it shall be thy royal throne.

6 Take my love; my Lord, I pour
at thy feet its treasure store.
Take myself, and I will be
ever, only, all for thee,
ever, only, all for thee. 

Let us be willing to say, “Lord, take my life. In whatever way that may be, take it. Take our lives, our hands, our talents, and let them be for You.”

Stay blessed and until next,