Are You Being Squeezed?
Romans 12:2 Don't change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but let God change you inside with a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to decide and accept what God wants for you. You will be able to know what is good and pleasing to him and what is perfect.
Do you feel sometimes, that you’re spending way too much time and energy trying to please other people? Trying be who they want you to be, doing what they want you to do … and yet somehow, it’s not all that comfortable a fit?
Other people invariably want us to dance to their tune. They want us to march to the beat of their drum. I’ve seen it in the workplace many a time. Someone gets hired into a job that they’re not quite suited to, and it’s like … the corporation tries to squeeze them into a mould that, try as they may, they just can’t fit into.
Or you’ve been living your life based on the principles and ideas that other people espoused, and you’ve discovered that they just don’t work. Take … casual sex. These days, it’s a recreational pursuit. One partner tonight, a different partner tomorrow night. And yet for many, for most, who’ve tried that, their heart is fit to break – even though that’s what society tells you is the norm these days.
The truth is, you can’t keep living like that. At some point, something has to give, something snaps. At some point, you get to thinking – surely … surely there’s another way.
Don’t change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but let God change you inside with a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to decide and accept what God wants for you. You will be able to know what is good and pleasing to him and what is perfect. (Romans 12:2)
I like that. In fact, one translation puts it this way: “don’t let yourself be squeezed into the world’s mould”, and for a good reason. You and I are never going to fit into a different mould. You and I were made to be free of all the things that other people tell us to do, that simply don’t work.
And we have so much of that bombarding us these days, we literally do need God to change us from the inside, with a new way of thinking. We literally need a God-breathed, God-given change of mind, to be all that He made us to be. To receive all that He has to give us.
Don’t let the world squeeze you into its mould.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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