Dominate

We put up our Christmas tree last night. It completely DOMINATES our living room! The footprint on this tree is HUGE-- five foot diameter, I measured. And the star is ALMOST touching the ceiling. ;) We've been working our way up from a Charlie Brown style Christmas tree by shopping the after Christmas sales. =) You may wonder why we felt the need to get this massive tree, since our house is small. One of the kids' favorite of our traditions is that we go shopping for ornaments each year. Each person gets to choose a new ornament for the tree. It looks pretty eclectic with Coca Cola cans, dogs, lions, bears, fish, and of course snowmen! ;) But I told Shorty last year that I can't bear-- at this point anyway-- to make the kids choose which ornaments to put on the tree and which don't make it out of the box any given year. So there you have it. I have a tree that is a decorating "don't", and we all LOVE IT!

Where am I going with this today? I was laughing as I thought about the concept of something dominating my life. I was created and redeemed so that Christ can dominate my life. He is doubly worthy to be my King. I thought that one reason that I'm okay with our huge Christmas tree is because, in about a month, it will come down. And I was contemplating how I will often allow something LESS than my King to dominate my life for a season... =(

We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.
Romans 6:9-18

I've been spending my devotions in Revelation. And the scene from Heaven is at the forefront of my mind right now. Let your life be dominated by the One who is Worthy.

And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!" And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."
Revelation 4:8-11
 
And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. And he went and took the scroll from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying, "Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth."
Revelation 5:6-10