As I reflect on the end of 2007, I am reminded more than anything that GOD can and will change everything in one moment. That one moment can be anything. A phone call, email, a chance meeting, etc...
Most recently for me was the moment when I was getting ready to register for classes at CCU, but was given a name of someone to contact about Special Education a few days before. I hadn't heard anything back and found the phone call I finally received back interesting as it was received minutes before I would have been registering. This phone call opened up the door to look into a Masters of Education degree at Regis University along with a license in Special Education. Not only that, it led me to the interview I had on Friday to TEACH while going to school in and for a Special Education classroom at a school in the Cherry Creek School District (like the best district in Colorado). This all has truly been the Hand of GOD. I had a plan, but HE led me to something much better.
I also got to spend a week alone in the mountains with GOD. Where HE once again began to speak, especially through the things I was reading (the end of "Soul Cravings" by Erwin McManus, as well as my usual "Our Daily Bread", "God Calling", and "Living the Message").
However, I have to admit that I held back from going deeper with HIM there. I recalled a year ago being in Indonesia on the Island of Bali at Kuta Beach and how loud and clear GOD spoke to me. Yet, I think about all that has happened since that moment and I am confused. I have this fear, sort of doubt that I haven't experienced before. I have this sense of loss, hurt, and disappointment that has made me fear drawing that close to GOD, at least in the way I had a year ago.
But then I think how GOD continues to change things with just a moment. HE has been and still is working and moving in my life. Though I have this fear, GOD speaks to those who take time to listen, and HE listens to those who take time to pray. HE seems to hit me right where my fear and doubts are. Again, HE spoke through the end of "Soul Cravings" and the past three days of "God Calling" really have parts or the whole devotion that stand out to me and fit with where I am at lately. They are:
December 29
...Go forward gladly and unafraid. I am with you. With man your task may be impossible, but with God all things are possible.
December 30 Fishers Of Men
When you think of those of whom you read who are in anguish, do you ever think how My Heart must ache with the woe of it, with the anguish of it?
If I beheld the city and wept over it, how much more should I weep over the agony of these troubled hearts, over lives that seek to live without My sustaining Power.
"They will not come unto Me that they might have Life."
Live to bring others to Me, the only Source of Happiness and Heart-Peace.
And to end the year with words I needed to hear:
December 31
Jesus. That is the Name by which you conquer. Jesus. Not as cringing suppliants but as those recognizing a Friend, say My Name- Jesus. "Thou shall call His Name Jesus for He shall save His people from their sins."
And in that word "sins" read not only vice and degradation, but doubts, fears, tempers, despondencies, impatience, lack of Love in big and little things. Jesus. "He shall save His people from their sins." The very uttering of the Name lifts the soul away from petty valley-irritations to mountain heights.
"He shall save His people from their sins." Savior and Friend, Joy-bringer and Rescuer, Leader and Guide- Jesus. Do you need delivering from cowardice, from adverse circumstances, from poverty, from failure, from weakness?
"There is none other Name...whereby you can be saved"- JESUS. Say it often. Claim the Power it brings.
As 2007 comes to a close I want to cry out to JESUS. I want to begin 2008 with that same cry and to say the Name -JESUS, every day as I grow ever closer to HIM this next year. I want to take all the fears and doubts away as I call on the Name -JESUS.
I want to close with a few quotes from "Our Daily Bread" over the past couple of weeks.
Though you cannot see the outcome,
Trust the Lord - He knows what's best;
Be assured He sees your trial,
And He's with you in your test. --Hess
Christ did not come to shield us from
The grief and pain of life;
But those who have His peace inside
Can thrive within the strife. --Sper
It matters not the path on earth
My feet are made to trod;
It only matters how I live:
Obedient to God. --Clark
Bye 2007, tomorrow a turn of the page, start of a new chapter.
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