My bloggin's really been lagging behind, so have most of my buddies out there.
One thing that's been rolling in my head and being reinforced with some personal study/youth group discussions, the need to be a slave to righteousness. In youth group we've been discussing how too often in our lives we feel like slaves to sin, but if we are truly saved and truly in God's flock than this cannot be. We can still struggle in our sin but we cannot be a slave to it because Christ has freed us from our bondage. And then when we are freed we are enslaved (in a good way) to Christ. We are to be slaves to righteousness and serve Christ not our own selfish ambition, desires, etc. I find this interesting not just because of what I'm studying and learning now, but also long ago when I first got my Bible I wrote on the side, "Serve your savior." I'm not sure I knew what the significance of that, it was probably a remnant Catholic belief that if I wasn't doing good works that I wasn't serving God, like I said, I'm not sure what possesed me to put that on there. But the phrase has recently taken on new meaning for me.
My co leader at youth group was emphasizing to the guys in the group that we shouldn't think of our goal in life not to sin, but rather to be righteous. We too often sit and dwell on our sin and concentrate so hard on not sinning that it consumes our whole mind and we end up sinning all the more. But my co leader challenged the guys, and myself, to look at our life in Christ not as not sinning, but as being righteous. In a way if we are so focused on not sinning, we are allowing ourself, our mind, to be oppressed by the sin. Its controlling our mind and our thoughts, our time is spent dwelling on the sin and focusing on not doing it. (I'm speaking in general terms and I don't have multiple personalities) So instead of not sinning we should focus on being righteous or in a way "serving our savior." So I guess after 6 years or so I'm starting to see some new meaning into "Serve your savior."