February 5th. Would You Stop Drinking Water If It Had Absolutely No Filters?
Some filters can save your life while others stunt it.
As a leader, stop and think how many filters are around. Some might have a colander for kitchen use. It washes your food removing the particles that you do not want. Your fuel filter on transportation vehicles keeps particles from entering your combustion chambers prolonging their usefulness.
Many water systems have filters on them to purify the water that you use for drinking or everyday use. They are all around us. All people have logic and mental filters as well. These filters are much subtler than a kitchen colander but certainly more powerful.
Our mind uses some without even thinking about them. You do not have to think about breathing to do it. We are built with a filter in place that allows that to happen without our consciousness. I suspect that your organization has some filters in it whether you know it or not.
Think about the mixture of how many people, with all their filters, are mashing them. What is likely to get through such an intense set of filters? If we do not arrange for our filters to be put in place on purpose the collection of personal filters will be in control.
Where might you build some filters to help your team? If an area seems to be breaking down or is worn out it just might be that you need a new filter. We could also have a filter that just needs changed. What is the first thing you can do to change your filters?
As brothers and sisters in Christ, we also build filters based on our experiences and thought processes. Sometimes those filters are not productive towards our connection with Christ, and we are not aware of it.
We might not realize that what can be filtered out are some of the critical elements that we want in our lives. We read, "Blind guides! You strain your water so you will not accidentally swallow a gnat, but you swallow a camel!” Matthew 23:24 NLT.
Jesus told about the religious leaders filtering their water so that even a gnat was kept from their drinking water. But he also said that they drank camels instead. We must be very careful of the filters that we create. They can keep us from loving Christ and from loving one another.
What is not in your life today? It just might be that if you are missing it, that you have a filter in place keeping you from it. Filters that do not connect us with Christ are not needed when we become a new person by accepting him.
Many of us have left in place those filters of our previous self and it can be difficult to remove them. What is the first thing that you can do about it in the next seven days?
Let us pray, Heavenly Father, you have told us “Ask and it shall be given.” You are the Creator and can do anything. But we realize that if we have a filter in the way, when you send what we ask for our filter will keep us from receiving it.
Help us to build honorable filters that keep out hate, envy and jealousy. Remove the unnecessary filters that we have that keep us from loving you, loving ourselves, and loving our neighbors. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen,
P.S. Want to learn more about what we do? Why do we use this devotional to help our people we relate with? Click here to see on the website. https://www.corescore.net/peer-to-peer-groups
