It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. Galatians 2:20.

We have renounced the hidden things of shame. 2 Corinthians 4:2.

Everything that is hidden will eventually be brought into the open. Mark 4:22.

And continuing our 351 Old Testament prophecies, promises of God, fulfilled in Jesus Christ, we come to number 144: His character-Goodness. Psalm 100:5: For the LORD is good; His lovingkindness is everlasting and His faithfulness to all generations. And, Matthew 19:16-17: And someone came to Him and said, “Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?” And He said to him, “Why are you asking Me about what is good? There is only One who is good; but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.”

From Hearing God by Dallas Willard today: “As God’s redemptive work progresses, communion with God advances to union with God. When the progression is complete we can truly say, “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:20 NRSV) and “For to me, living is Christ” (Philippians 1:21 NRSV). When communion advances into union, the sense of “mine” and “Thine” may often be absent. There is only “ours”. It is this union beyond communion that Paul speaks of when he says the redeemed have the mind of Christ as well as when he exhorts us to have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16; Philippians 2:5). Jesus prays the faithful might have this same union: “that they may be one, as We are one, I in them and You in Me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that You have sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved Me” (John 17:22-23 NRSV).”

Jesus knows how much we need His help. When my own heart is heavy with thoughts I can’t stop having that drag me down yet again, He asks me to give Him all of my heart trusting Him. I give it gladly. Circumcision of the flesh was the outward sign of the covenant people of God thousands of years ago. Circumcision of the heart, an inward thing, so needed by all then and now and for all eternity. It’s one thing to understand the relentless thoughts that just keep coming up are weighing heavy on me, it’s another thing to understand why. I don’t understand why. So I ask Him for help and understand even that asking is a movement God brings forward in me.

***THE JESUS PRAYER – LORD Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, the sinner. Desert Fathers (fifth century Egypt). See Luke 18:13.*** (But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, “God, be merciful to me, the sinner!”).