Tuesday, January 6, 2015

New day, every day......

It started Christmas Day, this unsettled feeling of something just not quite right and I ignored it as best as I could.  But it was still there a week later while my Bible lay collecting dust on my nightstand, a sure sign of running from something.

Backtracking, thinking, praying.  Ah ha.  It started with a photo.  A photo on Facebook of a family I love more than most having their Christmas in my old Indian living room without us (Golly, it was tiny. How did we ever fit in all the people that we did?).  I miss them, I miss that time, I miss that home.  I miss the feeling of purpose and the shared up's and down's.  I miss.

But the miss quickly turned into 'devil static' in my head.  That ol' grating whisper of "not enough." But I was never enough.  It was all Him when living there worked well.  If He was still giving us all the grace then we'd still be in the place.

Why do we we listen to the static accusations of expectations that we were never meant to fulfill?

"For the mind set on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace."
                                                   (Rom. 8:6)


One of the kids asked yesterday why people make New Year's resolutions.  I answered that it's because people like a fresh start, a new slate, the chance to begin again, to leave the past behind and focus on the new.

Why do we forget that every minute is new?  Take a breath, start again this minute and the next.  Forget what lies behind.  Focus on what's ahead.  Freedom.

"But one thing I do; forgetting what lies behind and straining FORWARD to what lies ahead...I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."  
                                                     (Phil. 3:13-14)

Each second is a fresh start. As I read Ann Voskamp recently, "Fall forward."  Fall forward for His arms to catch you.  Fall forward into that new start today.  

A letter from a friend.  She reminded me that I am the 'apple of His eye.' That He loves me entirely, completely, and I'm in the palm of His hand.  How easily we forget.  How easily we get clouded in thinking that what we DO is who we are when who we ARE is simply us and Him.  Basics.

Time to take a walk and see His creation.  Time to breathe Him in.  Time to silence the 'devil static' bringing guilt and unrest and recognize it for what it is.  Time to pick up that dusty Bible and let it wash like streams of living water.  In the simple yet powerful vernacular of the Newsboys:

Back and forth like a daytime drama
Up and down like a yo-yo mama
Say there's gonna be days like this 
'Cause light and dark don't coexist

How you gonna see through the fog?
How you gonna get back on course?
You ain't never gonna feel the force
If you don't connect to the power source

The source.  Our only place of real power to fuel our lives.  

"He will tend his flock like a shepherd;
he will gather the lambs in his arms;
he will carry them in his bosom,
and gently lead those that are with young.
                                             Is. 40:11

Gentle Source of all power, fill our lives today.