Jesus says if you want to have me, you must give up that other thing that has you.

Being a male capable of grunting, sweating, and not asking for directions, but not yet having conqured a women...in our culture, that wasn't manhood, that was dorksville!

But the commission is now. The time to speak is when the Spirit of God boils the message so hot within you that it must come out. The time to write is when God Almighty presses his thumb against your heart and forces the words out like a steaming geyser.

The principle is this: We must not allow anything into our life that feeds our point of weakness. A soldier doesn't dance through a mind field any more than we should play with a hand grenade. When the enemy's entry points are boarded up, it frees us to hear clearly the voice of our Commander.

Jesus didn't just give hugs; He also gave a hammer. Paul didn't just pass on holy kisses; he also tirelessly dealt out swift and holy kicks to the rear end of the ancient church. The Bible has the manly stuff intact, and that is why it is such a great mystery how it got lost in the modern church.

And the flesh is that reprehensible preference for self that lurks within every one of our hearts. It is that base and selfish instinct to preserve our own interests at the expense of God's interests. It's devious, it's deceitful, it's self-indulgent. It's interested only in selfish comfort and will happily crucify Christ afresh to secure it. God also has another name for it- sin.

The holy, all-loving, all-powerful, all-mighty, perfectly peaceful and joyful Life of God is waiting to be ours. It is a priceless gift that comes with only one condition: His Life can only be had in exchange for our own.