Sometimes things in our life have to die in order for something new to come forth.

As believers, when we trusted in Christ, the old died and something new was created (2 Corinthians 5:17). In fact, in Scripture it speaks in multiple places about our old way of life dying.

When something dies, it is no longer active. It no longer has power, ability, authority, or place. It is gone.

We love to think of our old life this way – dead and gone.

But what about our current life? Yes, we are in Christ. We are new creations. Yet, somehow, things creep back in. It’s like the zombie’s have arrived. Things we thought were dead are resurrected – emotions, feelings, hurts, insecurities, sins, influence of another. And they hold us in captivity where we sit at the table with them. We drink tea, we eat cookies, we converse, we fail to see the rotting flesh on their brittle bones.

Sometimes, the things that hold us in captivity don’t look like a putrid zombie at all. They are beautifully clothed, they smell inviting, they wear a mask that hides all the rottenness. And we accept it because it doesn’t seem “evil.”

Do you know what the worst part is? Every so often, we recognize it for what it truly is – something that should be long dead – but we don’t want to leave it. We don’t want to kick it out. It’s comfortable. We know it. It welcomes us.

And over time, it becomes part of us. It belongs. It is comfortable.

Guess what happens when we are comfortable? We don’t get up. We don’t do what needs to be done. We let life go on around us and we sit idly by because we are comfortable.

We accept all the decay until we don’t recognize it as dysfunction any longer. Instead we recognize it as home, as comfort.

Christ never called us to comfort. In fact, He is very clear that in order to follow, we must take up our cross. That’s not comfort – that’s death. He doesn’t comfort us in our dysfunctional living. He confronts the dysfunction so He can transform it into something new.

That’s my prayer for all of us. We will recognize the decay that has crept back in and see it for what it is. We will stop sitting in comfort and risk getting uncomfortable in order for God to confront the dysfunction.

In order to truly live…sometimes, things have to die.