This email was sent to me by a very special person in my life. In fact, the specialist! <grin> And I wanted to share.
Leonard Ravenhill, the old British preacher, had a list of ten questions he would ask himself from time to time.
This self-interview has had a powerful impact on anyone who dares to conduct it with honesty.
Would you like to know what those questions are? I warn you: don't seriously ask them of yourself unless you're prepared to give honest-to-God answers.
A Self-Interview
Ask yourself:
1. Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am a better person than I really am? (This is always a tough one. Is there the least suspicion of hypocrisy in my life?)
2. Am I honest in all my words and acts? (Do I exaggerate? Am I reliable? Can I be trusted? Do I confidentially pass on what was told to me in confidence? Do I smile at church and later grumble or complain about it in private?)
3. How passionate is my devotion to God? (Am I more excited about temporal things in the world than about the eternal Father who redeemed me and gives me everlasting life?)
4. Does the Bible live to me? Do I give it time to speak to me?
5. Am I enjoying my prayer life? Did I enjoy it this morning?
6. When I am involved in a problem in life, am I more likely to use my tongue, or my knees?
7. Am I disobeying God in anything or insisting upon doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?
8. When did I last speak to someone else with the object of trying to win that person to Christ?
9. Am I a slave to looks, dress, friends, work, or convention?
And finally...
10. How do I spend my spare time?
I challenge you to get alone with those questions and the Holy Spirit will do deep business in your life about priorities.
It needn't be a work of guilt or condemnation. That's not the Spirit's way. But if your experience is anything like mine, it will be a work of conviction and restoration.
It requires the courage the psalmist David exhibited when he said:
Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me and know my anxious thoughts; and see if there be any hurtful way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way. -Psalm 139:23, 24
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