If you are blessed, you are burdened, your mind is at peace with the assurance of your salvation, with the Sovereignty of the Most High, but your frustration level with the world and the path it is on is always high.
If you are blessed you probably have some form of physical pain on a nearly constant level, and you accept it as His will in your life, knowing full well that you will never have pain again, that this corruptible will put on incorruptibility. But I believe one of the greatest blessings is the burden for the lost, for that burden will drive you constantly to reach out to them, no matter the possible consequences to yourself.
If you cannot see them burning, screaming and in a state of complete and total hopelessness one day, then you do not know this burden.
“Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.” (James 4:17) I ask you, is it evil to not witness for the Lord Jesus Christ? Take this verse into consideration here, “So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.” (Luke 17:10)
If you are speaking to others for the glory of God and the salvation of their souls, which is a commandment found in Mark 16:15 then you do well, but if you are not, how can you consider yourself saved, how can you claim to be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, saved from the wrath to come when you have no burden for those who are under His wrath today? The woman who swept her entire house to find one coin called all her neighbors to rejoice with her, how can anyone claim to be saved by the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ not do the same when they have laid hold on the greatest prize available to mankind? “Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?” (Matt. 7:22)
I heard a man I respect say, “What answer will you give to God when He asks you why should I let you into my Kingdom?” Now, this is a ridiculous statement to make, and perhaps he now realizes this also, for if you are at the gate, you are going in. But how many of the lost would ponder this question and be unable to give the appropriate answer, and how many of them have you spoken to over the years that know the answer because you have shown them the way, the truth and the life?
If you do not have a burden for the lost, what is your burden for the Lord?
I believe most who claim Him as Lord have fallen into the trap of what is best called “self-righteous Christianity,” an oxymoronic term at best. Attempting to be the best “Christian” they can be so that the Lord will accept them, their burden is themselves, they are not concerned with the lost, but with the faults they perceive in themselves and so spend the majority of their time on themselves, trying to be better for God. They are not so much embarrassed about speaking to others about our Lord as they are trying to be pleasing to Him in themselves.
If you are being used by the Lord for His glory, Satan will notice you, and if the Lord so desires, He will allow him to buffet you. Feel blessed. If your battle with the flesh is constant, and never ceasing, feel blessed. If you have learned to hate this world and all that is in it, even mother, father, brother and sister, feel blessed. If your heart yearns to go home, and you wake up the next morning still here, feel blessed.
If you are expecting great joy, pleasures forevermore, no more pain and sorrow in the Kingdom of our Father and know not one of these burdens upon your soul here, it would be wise to introspectively look at your supposed salvation.
“Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.” (2 Tim. 3:12)
