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Take Responsibility
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Ezra 10:4 Take action, for it is your duty, and we are with you; be strong, and do it.
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Download audio fileLet’s be honest. Some people never grow up. Now there are different aspects to growing up; moving from childhood through those difficult teenaged years, into adulthood. One of them is taking responsibility for your life.
Of course, not everything that happens to us over the years – good or bad – is under our control. Often storms blow in that we didn’t see coming.
And yet it’s surprising how many things in our lives are, in fact, under our control. How many things we can change or influence through the decisions we take. A child looks to his or her parents when something’s too big for them to handle.
In fact, even for the day-to-day, children rely on their parents for somewhere to live, for the food on the table, for the clothes on their backs. They rely on mum and dad to run them here and there, to come and watch them play sport or get that award at the annual school speech night. That’s all as it should be, by the way.
But the reason that teenage years can be so difficult, is that those are the in-between years where we parents want to teach our children to take responsibility for themselves, and yet still live under our authority. That’s confusing, for the teenager and for the parents. That’s why there’s so much conflict, often, in those years.
When we come through that process though, what we should be, is responsible adults. Sure, we all have lots to learn, but we’re meant to be responsible for providing for ourselves and for taking control of the direction of our lives, as much as that’s possible, and for owning the consequences of our own actions.
Yet, so often, as adults, we want to abdicate those responsibilities. We want to blame other people or our circumstances or whatever, for our predicament. And that, frankly, is no way to live.
There was a time in Israel’s history, where they knew – they just knew, that they’d gone astray.
While Ezra prayed and made confession, weeping and throwing himself down before the house of God, a very great assembly of men, women, and children gathered to him out of Israel; the people also wept bitterly. (Ezra 10:1)
Now, they had some incredibly difficult decisions to make. And what they came to, was the decision to take responsibility for their mistakes and – listen to this, it’s really important – to take action to rectify their mistakes.
Take action, for it is your duty, and we are with you; be strong, and do it. (Ezra 10:4)
What is it in your life that you need to take responsibility for? What is it in your life that you need to grab a hold of, and as difficult as it may be, deal with?
Because until you take responsibility, things just won’t be right.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
Comments
Simonee Mulamata
Very powerful