NEW

Yesterday was my birthday and I don’t know about you but celebrating birthdays always makes me reminisce about the past.  Birthdays remind me of the differences (and similarities) of who I am now and who I used to be.  

I don’t know how many of you know who I used to be – here’s my take on it.  My parents divorced before I was five years old.  I lived with aunts, uncles, grandparents, friends’ parents, my mom, my dad, my dad and his new wife and my mom and her new husband.  Needless to say, I moved around a lot! 

I was confirmed in the local church but my mother didn’t attend.  My sisters and I went to church alone, or we pretended we went and walked over to the bakery and had donuts instead.   I really loved going to church but didn’t really feel welcome there and truly didn’t understand it all.  I listened though and still remember parts of the liturgy and music.  I had a yearning for it, if you know what I mean, but couldn’t quite put my finger on what I “yearned” for. 

In high school, I was a “goodie-goodie” – well, that’s what others thought anyway.   I met Mike my junior year and things went down hill from there.  My mom and her second husband divorced and all the moving around started over (after being pretty stable for about five years).  Mike and I had a very immature, selfish, jealous relationship which ended with me signing papers in front of a judge to have him arrested for beating me (this time in public).  I promised the Judge I would not marry Mike.  We did “reconcile” a couple times but thankfully, I kept my promise. 

I moved to Minnesota to get away from him - literally.  I yearned to start over, become a new person where no one knew me.  My dad lived up here and that is what I did - I became a new person – well, that’s what others thought anyway.   I went to church and even got confirmed as an adult.  I met and married my husband.  We attended church regularly.  I sang in church.  I loved it.

 Was I new though?  Sort of – I mean I had me a NEW man – I lived in a NEW house – I had NEW things – but the “yearnings” – those were still there and they were the same from before.  I mean I was changed - maybe not NEW but definitely not who I used to be.  But deep, deep down inside – new?   

My step-mom invited me to Bible Study and then I met Jesus Christ.  My heart swelled and melted when He came to me in a song one day.  Oh, my heart had been touched that way before but this time it was different.  This time was NEVER like any other time before.  I sobbed, I melted.  I prayed.  I yearned.  And for the first time, I surrendered.  I can’t tell you the date – or even the song.  I just remember it this way.  I was never the same again. 

Did all my problems go away?  NOPE.  Did I still have yearnings?  YEP.  But they didn’t consume me as before.  I didn’t dream about them as much.  I had me some NEW yearnings and some NEW focus. 

The rest is history.  Getting to know Jesus Christ, the Holy Son of God, thru HIS WORD and worship, is a truly life-changing, heart-wrenching, yearning-filling experience that has made me NEW – truly.  NEW inside.  NEW – RE-NEWED.  Just plain NEW.

Isaiah 48 says (AND I LOVE THIS):

Therefore I told you these things long ago; before they happened I announced them to you so that you could not say,‘My idols did them; my wooden image and metal god ordained them.’  You have heard these things; look at them all. Will you not admit them?

“From now on I will tell you of new things, of hidden things unknown to you.”

And you knew, of course, I would quote the 2 Corinthians verse:

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he (or she) is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

 

Today, October 1 is a new day.  It’s a new year for me and it’s a new year for you.  I pray that each of you meet the Lord, Jesus Christ here in this blog.  I pray that you become NEW through His Word and worship.  I pray He is your hope and your salvation. 

 

 
And may He meet every one of your desires and yearnings in a NEW way – His way.  In Jesus Name, Amen.