A Call to Die

When you read that statement you probably thought of suicide bombers, soldiers, or martyrs. But the truth is we all have a call to Die, To die to our self every day, and live in Jesus Christ. A Call to Die is a forty day, devotional type book that goes through a forty day journey of fasting from the word and feasting on God. The book was written by a man named David Nasser that was a Muslim until he was a freshman in high school. His family kicked him out of the house when he told them he was going to be baptized but eventually every member of his family came to Christ. I have heard his speak and he is amazing. The way he has persevered in his faith after facing so much adversity is amazing. We probably all have friends and family that are Christians, and most of us still find it too hard to throw out the things of this world and pick us your Cross. This was the first devotional book I ever did. I was a freshman in high school and had come to a brand new understanding of Christ the summer before when I went to church camp for the first time. I had truly dedicated my life to Christ for the first time that January. It was probably around may and I decided to stop feeding off of everyone Else's knowledge and relationships and decide to start my own, just me and God. People had really hurt me in the past, when I was in Jr. high. The rumors about me were terrible and the people starting them were the people I called friends, I had no where to turn and I was spiraling down a destructive path at the age of 14. His words opened my mind and made me want to learn more, be a better person and help more people and realize that people are always going to theme down. Nasser said,

“I realized people are always going to let you down. Churches will always let you down but Jesus Himself never will. He was the one calling me, and I said, ‘Jesus, I want You to save me from myself, from religion, from performance, from all these different things. It doesn’t mean that struggle goes away. It doesn’t mean that persecution goes away. It doesn’t mean that doubt goes away. It just means that you begin a new journey as a new you and that you’re not alone.”

As I tried and tried to do as the church, the Bible and the book told me I began to realize that, I would never be able to do it all, but then I read theses words.

“It’s not that salvation is easy. It’s that salvation is impossible when it comes to you being good enough because when are you good enough? When are you ever righteous enough? When are you ever pure enough? If there’s one thing I know I’m going to be consistent in today, it’s in being inconsistent. We all fail everyday."

I have done the 40 day fast from this book 3 times, every time I learned more and got something else out of it. Doing this blog over it just got me excited and I just want to do it again. I just wanted to briefly describe to you one of the devotionals for the day. Day 1 is called take up your cross. The verse used is Matthew 16:24, Then Jesus said to his disciples, "if anyone would come after me, he mus deny himself and take up his cross and follow me."

The first thing you must do is deny yourself. That is your innate selfishness. Your selfish ambitions to rise above others,our behaviors to get what we want when we want it, our attitude of caring only for out own interests and putting our own needs first. These selfish interests include gossiping, criticizing, cursing, lying, stealing, and acting selfishly in any way shape or form.

Next is obeying where God leads you wherever that might me. This means being attentive of what he wants when it comes to you friends, schools you attend, careers to pursue, who to marry,and how far to go in significant relationships. There is a journal with questions at the end of every devotional with a bible verse to learn and memorize every 3 days. I learned so much when I did this when it came to knowledge about the Bible and it truly helped me in my personal relationship with Christ and I would suggest it to anyone.