I first started going to Tennessee Temple University way back in 1976. Fortunately for me Mary started at the same time and the Lord got us together.
Lee Roberson was the chancellor of the school and the pastor of the church way back then. I always enjoyed his preaching. He had a balance that a lot of guys forgot about in those days and a lot of the the things he stressed still stick in my heart and mind today.
One of the things he stressed in his preaching was the simple phrase ‘die to self.’ It was based on this verse where Paul talks about the need in his life to ‘die daily.’
What does this ‘die daily’ or ‘die to self’ mean?
We get an idea from Romans 12.1-2. There we are told to offer our bodies a living sacrfice. To do that of course I must be willing to die to me and my self-centred and selfish desires. It means I take myself off the throne and put God and others ahead of me. I die to myself in order to serve God and other people. I love God and others more than I love me.
Dying to self is a tough thing to do because I like me a lot and I like what I want a lot. I like to satisfy me.
But its not about me. It is not even necessarily just about us Christians. The greatest people who ever lived thought about others first. Sure there and are richer and more famous and more powerful people, but the the greatest did not focus on the them. These are the ones who did the greatest good and left the most positive impact on the world.
If that’s true of the world – oughtn’t it to be even more true for us?
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