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Got Change?

by Jerry Ousley  
8/13/2010 / Christian Living

"You got any spare change mister?" I heard a voice from behind me. I was in Louisville, KY with my dad and at the time I was around nineteen years old. The voice came from a homeless man who had walked up. He smelled and was dirty. Dressed in rags he was the perfect picture of what most of us imagine when thinking of a homeless person.

I was reluctant to just give him some money and he responded by saying, "I'm hungry and need to get something to eat." It happened that we were parked directly beside a White Castle and so I offered to take him in and buy him a meal. He made several excuses and even at that young age I knew he was trying to raise enough money to buy something to drink. I insisted that he let me buy him a meal but instead he took off down the road, I suppose looking for someone else who might throw him a dollar or two. It was sad and I felt bad that I didn't just give him some money, but then I also knew that he really needed a meal more than he needed something else to drink.

The fact is that he needed more than loose change. He needed a change in his life. There are so many lost people in this world who need more than a handful of change; they need a life full of change.

There are a few things that need to take place before change can come. First we've got to change our mind-set. We need to take possession of our problems rather than always blaming them on someone, or something else. Don't you get tired of politicians always trying to pass the blame onto someone else? It seems that most today are more concerned about who to blame for the problems rather than just jumping in and fixing them. In recent tragedies Congress has spent hours and hours, and a whole pile of our tax money trying to put the blame on someone. Why not just use that valuable time and those resources to fix the problem? Then, if a criminal act was the cause, we can figure out whose fault it was. That sounds a whole lot more productive to me anyway.

Secondly we need to understand why we need change and then act on it. Debbie and I have spent hours counseling with people who needed a change in their lives. It seemed that they would talk on and on, and then finally we'd get a chance to advise them. They would recognize it as good advice and promise to follow through with it but the next time we'd see them it was just the same old same old. Christian counseling is good and can yield great results in the lives of others but if and only if, they are willing to take the steps to change their lives. No counselor can do that for us. If we want to change we've got to heed the advice given us, act on it, and then we can see change beginning to take place. But it will never happen if we talk and don't walk the talk.

Actually, like it or not, we are all constantly changing. It could be for the good or for the bad, but change is inevitable. Change comes with knowledge. If the knowledge we are receiving is bad then more than likely we are changing for the worse. That's why it's important to listen to teaching that is good.

Change can only come when we are willing to turn our situation over to the Lord. Oh, we may see some progress in the natural, but real and lasting change only comes through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We may say, "Just turn it over to the Lord." But how do we do that? It's a lot easier said than done! 2 Corinthians 3:17 tells us that where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. That word means that we are no longer a slave. But the deeper meaning is that we have an open face. In other words we are exposed; no secrets kept back. The only way we can really turn a situation over to the Lord is to completely expose the problem before God and often that is done by bearing all our feelings and emotions to a Christian Brother or Sister. When we learn to rely on each other, talk about our problems constructively, and be willing to take advice from believers and from God, then we are on the right road to seeing change in our lives and turning it over to God.

Make the change beginning today. It may take years to really see it accomplished, but we've got to start somewhere and sometime. What about it; have you got change?

Jerry D. Ousley is the author of ?Soul Challenge?, ?Soul Journey?, ?Ordeal?, ?The Spirit Bread Daily Devotional and his first novel ?The Shoe Tree.? Visit our website at spiritbread.com to download these and more completely free of charge.

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