My husband and I are DIYers! We do our lawn care, spray for insects, repair our broken appliances, and after a year of looking at living room furniture to replace our 13 year old mis-matched furniture, we decided we could pay less and have a solid piece of hardwood furniture to our exact specifications if we just built it ourselves. So we went to work on our coffee table!

I designed it. Madison built it. I figured we had most of the tools, and if we took advantage of free weekends and evenings, I could have my coffee table in a month or so. I had my coffee table … in just under a year! It turns out, forming rough boards into a beautifully smooth coffee table takes more tools than I knew existed, more processes than I fathomed, and much more time. But the end product is beautiful. Whenever people come over and admire it, I proudly announce that Madison built it. It was a labor of love.

There is another labor of love I enjoy that takes more tools, processes, and time than I ever imagined—my relationship with God. Transforming a head strong, selfish, undisciplined sinner like me into Christlikeness takes a lifetime and a strong, loving, patient God.

I didn’t realize how rough I was, nor did I comprehend that God wasn’t just going to wave a magic wand over me and perfect me instantly. All of my life He has been leveling me with truth, straightening me out with truth, sanding me with truth, and oiling and smoothing me with truth.

After thirty-seven years of knowing God, I’ve figured out what does NOT work: I can’t just memorize certain Bible verses and say them out loud like a magical chant to ward off tempestuous sins. I can’t do enough good deeds to make it onto Santa God’s nice list, so that He will answer my prayers, changing me in the manner and timing I desire. I can’t even do a focused study on a Fruit of the Spirit per month for nine months, pray for it to be evident in my life each month for nine months, and after nine months perfectly embody love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Becoming like Christ doesn’t seem to work that way.

How does God sanctify me, making me like Christ? My metamorphosis is occurring as I take in truth from the Bible and experience with His Spirit and His Body, the Church. He uses hundreds of sermons and Bible verses, marinating in my mind for weeks, months, sometimes years, and as I am awakened to those truths and their absence in my life, the daily work of obediently living them out begins. As some have said, “I’ve read many books, but the Bible reads me.” Bible verses memorized, Scriptures studied, church communities invested in, all of my living, loving, and doing with God, His Word, and His people have been used over long periods of time to change me—and the work continues until the day I die.

So, loving the Lord with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength doesn’t happen when I memorize Mark 12:30, frame it, and hang it on my wall. No, that may be the beginning. Learning and living Mark 12:30 takes years of praying for God to help me love Him with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength. It’s years of asking, “What does it mean to love God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength?” It’s years of watching other Christians and thinking, “They kind of look like they are loving God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength.” It’s living through periods of sorrow and joy, discovering that He sustains me, and is worthy of all my love.

Learned patience on the outside may look like a mom who maintains a smile on her face and does not lose her temper when her four year old turns a 20 minute grocery run into a 100 minute grocery store torture. But on the inside, patience is a mom who has learned how to be less selfish, how to prioritize people above things and schedules, and how to be still and know that God is God over a tired up-tight mom in the midst of chaos.

God doesn’t settle for surface behavior modification; He gets to the heart of my issues, begins changing me there, and then the Christlike behavior follows authentically—from the inside out. So, immerse yourself daily in the truth found in God’s Word. Listen and live out what you are reading, and be patient. You may not always recognize it, but God will be at work transforming you.

Scriptures that have shaped me in this area along the way:
Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. (John 17:17)

For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. (Hebrews 4:12)

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Romans 12:2)

Therefore, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, so now, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to his good purpose. Do everything without grumbling and arguing, so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God who are faultless in a crooked and perverted generation, among whom you shine like stars in the world, by holding firm to the word of life. (Philippians 2:12-16)

Jesus answered, “The most important is Listen, O Israel! The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is, Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other command greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31)

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The law is not against such things. (Galatians 5:22-23)

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 1:3-8)