With yesterday being my birthday, I woke up early, acutely aware that I don’t want to miss a moment. On my desk I have a scrap of paper on which I wrote a quote on 20th June this year….
It’s the ‘running out of time’ phrase that always gets me. If we spend our lives waiting for better times – stressing over current issues – anxious over daily irritations – we may never arrive at the elusive state of happiness we long for. We will run out of time.
Our final destination is eternity. Let’s enjoy the journey.
I read something in my Bible reading yesterday that I’ve never noticed before. I’ve been reading through the Bible every year for 10 years now and almost every November, I find myself in the Old Testament book of Ezekiel. It is probably my least favourite book in the Bible! I always look upon it with some trepidation. Filled with unusual imagery and pretty much doom and gloom, it’s a difficult book to understand.
On my birthday, the chapters I read are chapters 12, 13 and part of 14. Seven times, there is a phrase – a repetition I have never picked up on before.
Ezekiel 12:15
They will know that I am the Lord
The story of the Old Testament is an account of a people rebelling against God and His ongoing attempt to bring them back to Himself. All the bad stuff that happens to them is a result of their rebellion and for them to know that God is Lord.
We are living in New Testament times now – we are living under God’s grace. Jesus came to take away our sin, but this does not mean we should succumb to the permissiveness that pervades our Christian society. God wants us to live in obedience to Him.
God is with us on our journey – every. single. moment.
God allows stuff to happen to us and through it He reminds us that He is the Lord.
He is the ONLY One who can be trusted.
His love for us is so high, is so wide, is so long, is so eternal. He constantly gives us opportunities to make right with Him – to come back to Him – He wants us to know that He is the Lord.
Living in obedience to God is for our own benefit. When we blatantly go against his Biblical blueprint for life, there are consequences that lead to pain and heartache. We cannot control others and their behaviour, but we can control ourselves.
Our job, not our spouses or our children, our job is to remain faithful to God – to trust fully in Jesus – to seek Him daily, to live humbly and to love mercy.
I have to do that TODAY.
#85 of my 1000 thanks is that whatever God does in my life it is so I will know that He is the Lord. Amen!
I wrote all the above yesterday which is a good thing because today we have been without internet so I am able to finish the blog off on my tablet using data. The highlight of my birthday has to have been the unexpected surprise arrival of Stacey and Adrian who drove in from Swellendam to have a big birthday breakfast with me. That made my day. It was wonderful to see them. While we speak often, we have not seen them since February. Wonderful to have both my son and daughter in one place for a quick photo opportunity. They are all looking and doing well.
Stacey and David 5/11/2016
#86 of my 1000 thanks – Adrian and Stacey’s surprise arrival. Birthday blessing indeed!
These are the days!
Keep the smile going.
God bless you!
In His Grip,
Helga xx 🙂