Greater things are yet to come...

"There are far better things ahead than any we have left behind" C.S. Lewis.

I'm hard pressed to believe my own title with a year like 2010 behind me. It's been interesting for me looking back over 2010 to realize that what has been with out a doubt the most challenging, and difficult year of my life has also proven to be one of the best. Now I don't mean 2010 was a dream and I just wish I could put time on repeat and live it over and over again - although it did contain a few of those kinds of days. No, what I mean is that in so many ways faith became sight for me as I watched God carry friends and family through some of the most difficult things they had ever faced, and then felt the Lord carry me through my own battles and heartaches. For those of you who may not know all of what I'm talking about - I'd love to share my story with you, but the most exciting part of it all is - I can't tell you the ending, because I'm still a work in progress.

Last night as I was thumbing though "My Utmost for His Highest" trying to pick what page I wanted to read before turning out the lights, I did something highly unlike me: I read the devotional for the actual day it was - and I'm glad I did too. The title of it was simply this: Intimate with Jesus. I was immediately pulled in. Over the last few days I've been in a rather reflective mood and couldn't help but think that a life truly in love with Jesus would probably look a little bit different than mine - okay a lot-a-bit different. The verse under the title was John 14:9 -"Have I been so long with you, and yet hast thou not known Me?" The words were spoken by Jesus nearly 2 thousand years ago - but I could have sworn they were written for me on January 7, 2011.

Now because I can't possibly say it as well as my friend Oswald Chambers put it here's basically what that little page said :

"...The last One with whom we get intimate is Jesus. Before Pentecost the disciples knew Jesus as the One Who gave them power to conquer demons and to bring about a revival. It was a wonderful intimacy, but there was a much closer intimacy to come - 'I have called you friends.' Friendship is rare on earth. It means identity in thought and heart and spirit. The whole discipline of life is to enable us to enter into the closest relationship with Jesus Christ. We receive His blessings and know His Word, but do we know Him?...Once we get intimate with Jesus we are never lonely, we never need sympathy, we can pour out all the time without being pathetic. The saint who is intimate with Jesus will never leave impressions of himself, but only that Jesus is having unhindered way, because the last abyss of his nature has been satisfied by Jesus. The only impression left by such a life is that of the strong calm sanity that Our Lord gives to those who are intimate with Him."

Interesting how so few words shook me to my core. I've talked about how 2010 was a year that acquainted me with my Savior in ways I never knew before - maybe it's time I started acting like it. It's become too easy for me in school to go through each day with the sole purpose of reaching the end of it alive, and in one piece. So I suppose you might call this my New Years Resolution (albeit a few days late) - I don't want to merely survive each day, I want to spend it loving my Savior with my life - and hopefully I will disappear and He will be the only one I leave an impression of.

 

Hello 2011, I cannot wait to see what you have in store!

~ Shaela