New Beginnings

I recently found out that I will become a grandmother.  It is hard for me to wrap my brain around this truth. I think to myself, I am way too young to be given such a title.  Yet, I sigh deeply here, I was a young mom myself.  The last thing I wanted was for my son to mimic my behaviour.  I would have hoped and I have prayed that this would not be the fate of yet another child in my family.  A child born to parents that are unmarried. A child living in two homes, split between mom and dad.  Worse yet, a child that was lacking a clear example of doing it God's way.

Yes.  I would have stayed with these recurring thoughts had it not been for my GOD.  "Renew your mind daily" He so wisely tells us in his word.  I really didn't consciously sit down and decide to renew my mind. I didn't do anything other than pray, read and listen. I continued to praise even when my heart wanted to say NO!!!! This is not my plan for my son. Well, it isn't but God certainly doesn't need me to give him any hints or help where RKR is concerned.  He already had a plan that will give him hope and a future.  That plan stands today and will continue to stand until it has been accomplished.

So I raise my hat to new beginnings, new seasons, new hope.  It is God who we must acquiesce to in all things.  God is still the One that gives us beauty for ashes. He is still the One that turns a mess into a message, a test into a testimony and all the other things that we so smartly coin to say each other. :-)  Remember, He is the One that forms  a baby in its mothers womb.  He puts together that baby so perfectly that David marvelled and said of himself, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made".  He is the God that even now stands at the end while we are still at the beginning.  He works all things for the good of those who love Him.  So you see, my mind has been renewed; reworked by promises that are true.  I say yes and AMEN to them all.  Hip Hip Hooray! There is a baby on the way!

The Journey

The journey has a beginning point and a destination point. 
Where did we start. Where are we now.  Where are we going.
A quote was that the journey if a thousand miles begins with one step. Someone else has said the journey us within. And still another has said that it is not so much the outcome but the journey itself.  To be sure you cannot stand still on any journey. To get from start to finish requires movement. For some it may be tiny steps others it may be a Giant leap.  For some the pace may be slow and for others it is like a sprint to the finish.  The journey for some may be like a paved road for others it may be a like a path  not oft trod. In this journey I chose to believe that God is with me. I actually believe that he frames my beginning and my end. He was and is to come. In the middle of Him is me and Him. 
I have to believe that He fore knew the valleys and pits of my journey and I have a predestined end.  That He is walking with me like the footprints poet wrote. That He has not left me to do this alone.
My faith is made whole when I read the bible. God's word says:
 Genesis 1:1-2 GW

In the beginning God created heaven and earth. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep water. The Spirit of God was hovering over the water.
Before I was a thought, God existed.  He hovered over the waters of nothingness. He is the creator of all things that I see. He therefore has my journey mapped out. Lest we forget our steps are ordered by Him. He is the beginning of us. He who created us from the dust of the earth certainly can sustain our journey here in this same earth He created. He is the beginning. He is the Alpha. He is the A. He is the God who is everything. He is the I Am.

From the beginning God has a predestined end. To think otherwise is to be unwise.  It is in fact to be in denial of Hid word which we know is all truth.  God says that the end of our journey meets Him face to face. We may become desensitized to this truth thinking in the back of our minds that it has been over 2000 years. Yet here again we see in  God's word:
 Revelation 22:20-21 GW

The one who is testifying to these things says, “Yes, I’m coming soon!” Amen! Come, Lord Jesus! The good will  of the Lord Jesus be with all of you. Amen!

At the end we will all face Christ. Whether we believe in Him or not we will meet him at the end of this earthly journey. He will be the judge of us then. 
If our desire is to be where He is then  Our journey is Routed out in Christ. In Him we will arrive at this desired  destination. It means then that our hearts can be at rest.  The bible says thus
 John 14:1-3, 6 GW

“Don’t be troubled. Believe in God, and believe in me.  My Father’s house has many rooms. If that were not true, would I have told you that I’m going to prepare a place for you?  If I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again. Then I will bring you into my presence so that you will be where I am.  Jesus answered him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one goes to the Father except through me.

To Obey Is Better

On a hiking trip with my family this weekend I learnt something.  The trail that we walked on was beautiful and long.  It went winded itself along a creek that often times was hidden behind enormous trees.  It was a day worth walking and we went ahead with enthusiasm and gusto.  Unbeknown to me and others in the group, the walk had turned into a race to the finish line, where ever that ended as no one had yet completed the trail.

So the leaders of the pack set off and we left behind choked on their dust.  It became obvious that we would never catch them.  Curve after curve showed no signs of my two sprinting aunts.  We came upon a sign that said DO NOT ENTER/TRAIL CLOSED CONSTRUCTION.  We should have met upon them here but they were nowhere to be seen.  We stood pondering if they would have gone ahead despite the signs.  We waited for a bit until I decided to go after them.

While I called out for them by name and silence responded I thought to myself, this is just how we are as believers.  How many times do we see the signs and ignore them?  We have a bible that maps out the danger and still we find ourselves in them.  We close our eyes or we say as my aunt did, “but I saw other people coming from there!”  The road to sin and hell is wide and filled with people.  Or perhaps we reason to ourselves, there really isn’t any danger. My aunts said “oh there was no construction today…it is a Saturday.”  There is a way that seems right unto a man but the end is destruction.

 

While we had a good laugh over my two aunts who high fived each other at the end of the trail and told us they won, there really is no good outcome to the end of sin. The wages of sin is death.  The outcome reaching far into our eternity and too costly for either of us to pay. 

Beloved today we need to take heed to the word of God ad flee from sin and all things that of evil intent.  We cannot be glib (casual) about what we are told to do by God's spirit.  We must obey the signs that God has given us.  It is not there as a suggestion.  To believe we must obey; loved ones it is the better way.