Becoming All His

"Dear Children, keep away from anything

that might take God's place in your heart."

1 John 5:21

"Those who find their sense of security in Christ

are not easily shaken by circumstances

or other people's opinion of them."

I love my Bible! Each year I re-read my Bible, and each year the Lord opens up new bits of wisdom and understanding. That's the way it should be. For the past two years I have been using The Daily Walk Bible for my daily devotional time. I cannot face a day without grabbing hold to a word from the Lord. Sometimes it seems like He's sleeping in, as I don't always feel His presence with me. I don't blame Him as 5 am is a pretty early start of the day, especially with New Mexico winter approaching. But then, God never sleeps! And although I may not feel His presence, I know He is right here with me. He never leaves me, even when I am sleeping.

In the book of Mark Jesus has such compassion on the crowds of people who are following hot in pursuit desiring to see more miracles and to listen to Him speak. All they want is to spend more time with Him. Imagine what that must be like! To walk with Him, talk with Him, see His beautiful face, His lovely smile, sincere eyes, and experience His love firsthand. In the discussion this morning the writer mentions that whereas Jesus healed two blind men on two separate occasions, He used different methods to heal. In questioning why this may be he responds so: "Most likely it was because Jesus' methods were often tailor-made to the individual's needs." Good answer! He has made us each intricately woven together from the beginning of our time, from our inception, and even so before that!

The writer wants us to understand that as this is Jesus' way with healing so it is with spiritual lessons as well. With each miracle Jesus performed even His own disciples failed to understand what they were experiencing first hand. Jesus told them that He used parables for this reason, but Jesus always explained. Still the disciples did not see. We still do not see.

This morning I took a chance, a huge risk of making a member of my family angry by mentioning my faith in God. I was told there no solutions to a certain problems, but I know better. How anyone cannot look at their lives and see the miracle of life all around us. I see miracles in my life every day, and I am trying to testify as often as I can as to how great our God truly is! Sometimes it takes the blind to see and the deaf to hear and the lame to walk. I am not talking in the physical sense. I have been all those things in my life physically, emotionally, spiritually, as have we all. I am just not afraid to admit that I have sinned and fallen VERY short of the glory of God. No one arrives. We are all in the process of becoming.... 

I began my walk with Jesus as a child reading from the King James Version of the Bible. I still love those words, as it is the version I memorized and still hold in my heart. All the "thees" and "thous" never confused me, because Jesus was right there translating the words to the heart of a child. I still have the heart of a child, and I hope I always do. I have put off childish things as we are instructed to do in order to go from the milk of the word to the bread, but there is so much still to learn. Just as in life we learn something new every day, although we are so busy we seldom identify it. I am so tired of being pulled down by the weight of the world that I fail to see the blessings. That is the way the world has become, and those who profess to follow Christ in this age fail to see that we are succumbing to the pressures. The only solution to our problems is Jesus. 

I told a co-worker just yesterday that it is a wonderful feeling to be full retirement age, knowing that if I choose I can simply leave my job. It is a new-found freedom I feel, and it is as if the stress of the work doesn't have an effect on me any longer. Nor do attempts made by others to ensnare me or manipulate me have a stronghold on my life. I am becoming...His. All His. And the idols of the world are not a temptation to me. I look around me, and I see memories filling each room. Nothing of great earthly value, but people who visit me feel comfortable, peaceful, and entertained when they walk through the doors. My Christmas tree of memories gets many inquiries, as do the many stuffed friends who greet my guests and who have to be cautiously moved aside to allow one to be seated. My Bible studies always begin with laughter over some inane thing or another. But I don't mind, because it who I am...uniquely His and very much still a child at heart despite my 66 years of age. I can still climb a tree or hang upside down from "monkey bars" with the best of them. I am ageless and dauntless in my life and in my walk with Jesus. Truth is He still carries me at times, but we also walk hand in hand together by the troubled seas and along the thorny paths. My journey is just beginning.