Weeds?...or real life?

Galatians 6:7-8, as printed in The Message, tells us "Don't be misled: No one makes a fool of God. What a person plants, he will harvest. The person who plants selfishness, ignoring the needs of others - ignoring God! - harvests a crop of weeds. All he'll have to show for his life is weeds! But the one who plants in response to God, letting God's Spirit do the growth work in him, harvests a crop of real life, eternal life."

This scripture wording is powerful, because it convicts me about failing to follow God's leading in my life. God's Holy Spirit leads us and by failing to respond is ignoring God. I remember long ago, after praying about a person having trouble, a former pastor told me 'Doug, from prayer comes action' ...I didn't want that advice from him because he wasn't letting me put the problem in God's hands, and letting me walk away from it, in so many words...planting selfishness or sowing weeds!

Let's talk about real life! What's that look like? As we live in the here and now, at best we can only get a brief glimpse of what eternal life with God would be like. Jesus' life was a perfect example of how we should try to live and love each other. And it strikes me that in all of my weaknesses,  loving perfectly in an imperfect world, while impossible, is what we are called to never give up trying to do...you know...What would Jesus do? And best of all,  letting God's Spirit do the growth work in us.

I am reminded of the book by Brother Lawrence, "Practicing the Presence of God", where he tried to spend all of his waking moments by using all of his skills and talents to glorify and praise God through his actions. He longed for the day that he would be with God praising Him in eternity! He always wanted to be the most perfect worshiper he could possibly be. In the same way, our daily actions should be an act of obedience to WWJD?

Let me close with the words from The Message found in 1 Corinthians 13: 12-13: "We don't see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright. We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing Him directly just as He knows us. But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly, and the best of the three is love."