A New Default Setting
Are you ready to give up on life and just don’t know where to turn? This lesson helps to understand how you can have the power to live a dynamic Christian life.
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“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…Those who live in accordance with the Spirit have minds set on what the Spirit desires…You are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you” (Romans 8).
Even as I depend on my computer for the activities of daily life, I am also frequently frustrated when my assumptions about what it can or will do prove to be in error. Why do margins or indentations change? How can information I thought I had inserted into a document suddenly alter? In their effort to explain this phenomenon, technology experts toss around the phrase “default setting” as though they think I understand! “The computer is just returning to its default setting,” they say with feigned patience.
So what do these terms mean? A basic definition goes something like this: Default settings are controls of a computer or software as preset by its manufacturer. Some types of default settings may be altered or customized by the user.
A spiritual application comes to mind. When God created us, he declared us good—His perfect default setting. But then man and woman changed that setting by choosing to set themselves in opposition to God…they sinned. Ever since that point in time, a new “setting” has been a part of our nature: “All have sinned” (Romans 3:23) and “sin entered the world through one man and death through sin…because all sinned” (Romans 5:12).
But God in His infinite wisdom and love chooses to make possible a new default setting: Christ comes to not just change a few incidentals in our lives, but to make us new creations. He installs totally new controls—the person and work of the Holy Spirit.
Too often I think and act as though I must live according to those old settings, forgetting that because of the redeeming death and resurrection of Christ, and through the power of God’s Spirit I can walk as a new person.
We are not machines but children of God who loves us unreservedly and gives us all we need to walk in newness of life with Him.
Father, help me quickly turn to you instead of to my natural desires. Thank you for always being available and willing to change my heart.
Questions: Can you think of ways that you are still living your life in the same manner as before Christ came into your life? How would your life be different if you remembered that you are a new creation and have the power of Christ in you?
About the Author Marilyn Ehle
Daily audio podcast: Hear today’s daily devotional, A New Default Setting, read aloud on the Men’s Devotional Blog
Tags: computer, default, error, Holy Spirit, indentation, infinite wisdom, love, margins, patience, software, technology
5 Responses to “A New Default Setting”
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Update, I am doing much better about this. It was just a few devotionals ago where we should be slow to speak and fast to listen. I try to use this as well as when I say a cuss word I think of 10 things I should have said and I have my three year old to help. I caught myself saying while driving one day and almost running into a car who had a failing blinker “Turn your f’in blinker on” I apolgized to my daughter and then said I should have said that silly blinker isn’t working, or they have a broken blinker. She chimed in and said “ya mommy, that is a broken blinker”. Trying other words to say helps you say something different later on. It has been working well and has helped me to realize to be slow to anger and slow to blame.
Thank you, this was a great application/ illustration.
thank you
Julile, you are already heading in the right direction by recognizing what makes you feel very uncomfortable especially when your daughter points out, what sounds to her precious ears, that the word you just said is bad. You might write on several pieces of paper “Lord please keep one hand over my mouth and one on my shoulder.” Tape papers to the mirror in your bathroom or bedroom on the refregerator or in your car. When those nastey words begain to form in your mind ask God’s forgiveness and his guidance. Soon that old bad habit will be no more.
Amen to you and Blessings
Bonnie
I was raised in a church and have walked with God most of my life until I entered into early adulthood. Now, I have turned back to Jesus, I see many things I would like to change. Most importantly at this time is cussing so much. I cuss with out even knowing it. My daughter is 3 and she will tell me that I just said a bad word. I pray that I can stop cussing all the time. Any ideas on how to quit when you don’t realize you are even doing it?