Matthew 16:25-26 If you try to hang onto your life you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake you will save it. And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul? Is anything worth more than your soul?

 Wanting to do life and things our own way will never bring about the peace, joy, and satisfaction that we yearn for in life. I have learned from experience exactly what these verses are talking about. For over half of my life I wanted to do what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it. If my mind said go eat some ice cream but my spirit said that I shouldn’t eat it I would still eat the ice cream. Then I would be mad at myself because I knew that I was trying to lose weight and I didn’t need that ice cream. If I was mad at someone and wanted to give them a piece of my mind I did so. Then I would be filled with guilt and shame for the horrible things that I said to the person. Whatever I wanted to do, that is what I did, even if a part of me was telling me that I shouldn’t do it. I don’t know if you would call it selfishness, sinful nature, the flesh, rebellion, or disobedience, but whatever you want to call it I was ate slam up with it. I can’t tell you how many times I would have the feeling or thought that I shouldn’t do what a part of me wanted to do but chose to do it anyways. And it never failed, the end result was always a bad one.

 I didn’t know anything about how the Holy Spirit worked even though I had been first saved when I was 13-14yrs old. I knew nothing about the flesh and the Spirit or the sinful nature that is within us. I didn’t know about choosing life or death or the fact that I even really had a choice. Once I rededicated my life to Jesus and started reading the bible I learned that we had been given the gift of free choice and that we could choose life or death. God gave me a revolation of what choosing life or death really meant. It was like He gave me the secret receipe to being able to have an outstanding life no matter what the circumstances were like.

 I remember sitting on the side of my bed one night not too long after I had rededicated myself to Jesus. The room was dark and quiet with only the sound of the ceiling fan going around and around. I was praying, telling God that I didn’t want to live my life the way that I was living it before my accident. I said, ” you know God, obviously the way that I have been living life isn’t working so I am going to try it your way because what do I have to lose.” It was like a switch went on (or off) in me that night because the resistance that I use to have when I was faced with a choice was no longer there. From that moment on every time I was faced with a choice I would have the thought, “life or death, which do you choose,” come to my mind.

 As time went on I continued making “life” choices and after about a year I had changed so much. I was at peace and was happy for the first time in my life. I had grown and changed to the point that it was rare that I had to make myself make the right choice because the right choices came naturally. When I came across Matthew 16:25-26 I was like, “that is exactly what I did. I gave up my life (my way) for Him (His way) and I did save my soul because I am finally alive on the inside.”

 Before I started living His way I thought that life and happiness was about achieving what I wanted when and how I wanted to, making money, and having a family. I often had the thought, “I will be happy when _______.” And that blank would be filled with all kinds of materialistic things over the years. I was searching for life and lasting happiness but I could never find it.

 Once I began doing things God’s way I quickly discovered that I had it all wrong the whole time. I could have gained the whole world but I still would not have had life and lasting happiness because none of those things (what the world offered) could bring life to my soul. There was no person, place, or thing that could give me what I was lacking inside to experience true life. True life has nothing to do with what we can accomplish, achieve, adhere, or obtain. It has nothing to do with the amount of money we have, the size of our house, the type of car, the brand of clothing we wear, or the people that we know. It is about being in line with God’s will for you, living life by His example, and following His guidance for the purpose that He has for you. When we live our lives in this manner we know that we are doing the best that we know to do at any given moment, that we are doing His will for us, that we are fulfilling His purpose, that we are pleasing God, and we have a greater meaning to life. Because we are living this way we have no shame, guilt or regrets. There is no should have’s or wish I would have’s. There is nothing to feel sorry or bad about. There is peace, joy, hope, satisfaction, purpose, contentment, and the feeling of truly living. It’s a feeling of completeness, a satisfaction that nothing else can give you.

 When we decide to give up our way of living (our life) for His sake (His way of living) we are trading a fictitious life for real life. We are freeing ourselves from the world standards of life and the standards that we had set for what a great life had to be like. We release pressure off of ourselves from all of the “must have’s” in order to be happy. We free ourselves from ourselves and enable ourselves to live our best life because as long as we are in line with God we are doing things and life right.

 It is in our DNA to want to do things our own way, when, where, and how we want to do it. It may not sound very pleasing to our brain and feelings to do life any differently than how “we” want to do it. But I can promise you that if you choose to give up your way for God’s way you will end up gaining so much more than you could ever gain for yourself and you will finally experience what the true meaning of living is.