Hey I hope everyone is doing well, I just want to share again out of my devotion and where i believe God is challenging me as a Christian along with all the other responsibilities God has given me to uphold.  So I hope it is encouraging yet challenging as well.
Hebrews 11:24-28
4 By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, 25  choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26  He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. 27 By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.
Context:  As an example of faith for us to be encouraged by, Moses had the opportunity to live in luxury in Egypt as royalty, willfully turned that down for the sake of His love for God and his people. Although that love relationship with God caused him to choose God over a worldly life, it was that same love that caused him to endure his call to lead the children of Israel and even be rejected from going to the promise land!  From the beginning, in the middle, and until the end, it was all about the relationship that caused Moses to endure it all faithfully.
v24,25)-As we know there is nothing naturally in us that desires to suffer any hardship, especially if we can choose something better!  Yet like Christ, Moses chose to suffer for God with His people, because by God’s grace he had the relationship as the center of his life.  In seeking God’s face for renewed love in the relationship, and not just His hand for blessings we then see Him as worth going through suffering.  WIthout love motivating our faith we simply choose what we visually think is best.  Because to weigh the two options, suffer or enjoy pleasures, is a no-brainer naturally.
v26)-I think a legitimate question to ask is, “what is the reward for choosing Christ over the world’s rewards?”  I believe to even consider sacrificing what is immediately gratifying is because there is an alternative that you are actively looking towards that is worth the wait.  This is why we need faith.  Moses had his mind focused on God’s will by faith, which exceeds beyond this world onto the God of heaven.  So Moses, like Jesus was willing to embrace indentifying with God and His will, as more important than indentifying with anything else.  In short, Moses had his identity wrapped up in God.  So Moses knew who he was, and was able to measure anything that came in his life that could compromise his identity in God, and then prioritized everything else.
v27)-I believe if you think about Moses life, there was nothing easy about it.  Yet I think that is true for most people, so the greatest gift of grace I believe God gives a believer is perserverance or endurance.  Simply the ability not to quit!  Even as Christians it is very possible to quit and still be active in church.  Because the “lynchpin” between enduring and quitting is “seeing Him who is invisible”.  This is why I believe people hold onto to duties in churches and are willing to “fuss” over them b/c that has become their identity and not Christ.  To quit in Christianity is not to stop going to church and doing your share.  But quitting (backsliding) is to stop putting your relationship with God first, and then out of your own strength try and do spiritual work!  How many times do we quit in marriages?  We can almost feel when the person who we date or are married to has quit, but we’re still together doing duties, still taking out the trash, etc.  Moses endured his life and all the hell in it by seeing Christ who is invisible.  So my question is, have you quit, and if you have, God hasn’t quit on us and beg us to come back into the “marriage” with our whole heart to be renewed in love and zeal for His will.
In His Love, Ld