Spiritual Success Is Up to You

Hey there. Thanks for listening to the Greg Laurie Podcast, a ministry supported by Harvest Partners. I'm Greg Laurie encouraging you.

If you want to find out more about Harvest Ministries and learn more about how to become a Harvest Partner, just go to harvest.org. If you crash and burn, if you're failing constantly in your spiritual life, that's your choice. And if you're succeeding in the spiritual life, that too is your choice. You're saying, Greg, you got it wrong. You're making it all about self-effort.

No, I'm not. I'm just telling you that there's God's part and there's my part. One verse that sums it up perfectly is when Paul says, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. Then he goes on to say, for it is God that works in you both the will and do of his good pleasure.

That shows our part and God's part. He says, work out your own salvation. Now that doesn't mean work for your salvation.

You can't work for it. It's a gift from God. To work out one's salvation means to carry it to the goal and complete.

It's actually a term used in mining, like go into the mine and get the gold out. That's what it means to work it out, live it out. But then it says, for it is God that works in you both the will and do of his good pleasure. God will give you the strength to do it, but you need to do your part. Listen, there's some things only God can do and some things only we can do. Only I can confess my sin. Only I can repent of my sin.

Only God can forgive me of my sin and transform me. So let's do our part and God will do his part. And this means that I need to apply something on my life called discipline. Ah, that's not a very popular word in the 21st century. We like everything fast and quick and immediate. We don't want to wait for anything. But the Bible uses words like abiding, discipline, obedience, being still.

And in our fast food, quick culture where everything can be gotten at demand, this is something we're not used to. But if you want to grow spiritually, you need to discipline yourself to get into God's word every single day. I encourage you to do that. Work out your own salvation every single day.