Growing in Grace

Sitting down to pray this morning - a frosty start but the sun is shining, the golden leaves shimmering  - Autumn is slowly turning to Winter - But still a lovely time of year.  Each season has it's own beauty if we have eyes to see it.  Just like our lives, it is season by season, we are never standing still but always changing.  This morning I began to read over my notes from 2017, and I realised that I was saying and writing basically the same words that I am still writing - BUT - as I read them I can see that my understanding and whole perspective towards these words have changed.  Then 2 years ago I was writing down the promises of God that I had found - and I was choosing to believe them because they were God's Word. BUT now I can see the growth and deeper understanding that has happened in me - I can see that these are not just words written on a page but they have become one with and in me.  I have grown to know not just believe these truths.  I can see how much more alive they are in me and to me.  Like seasons change and we know they have changed but we can't put our finger on one day - they seem to run into each other in perfect harmony and everything in life just moves along and adapts with it.  So it is in our lives, we are moving along, changing and growing, we don't always see the change until we stop and look back.

The last few years of my life have been an amazing and treasured time of personal growth and experience with my Saviour Jesus Christ and my Heavenly Father.  I really do feel like I am a brand new person.  The Holy Spirit has challenged my thinking and beliefs to my very core and is still working in me.  I now see how far I have come and at the same time I am very aware of how much further I have yet to go.

As I'm thinking over these things, my mind begins to think about how we paddle at the edge of the sea on a beach getting our feet wet - we really have no idea of the vastness of the ocean.  We are in total control of how far we go into the water.  But as we wade out further, at first adjusting to the cold water, taking each step carefully so we don't fall, we are very conscious of not going to far away from the safety of the dry ground of the beach.  We want to be able to run back easily when we think we have had enough.  This is a place of self-preservation, where we are looking after ourselves.  This is a wise thing in the natural, because the vast ocean with its tides and waves is a very dangerous thing that we must use wisdom and give respect to it.  But on a spiritual level, like much of God's Kingdom principals we cannot use natural wisdom we must rely on the Holy Spirit to guide and lead us in spiritual wisdom.  The vast ocean of God's love and mercy is not a dangerous place, yet few ever really enter into it beyond getting their feet wet close to the shore, never venturing for from the safety of our own self perseverance.  It is ironic that as we endeavour to keep ourselves safe we usually end up putting ourselves in danger.

There is much about self image, self confidence, self respect and so on, in today's world, but without Jesus it is all vanity and just a waste of time.  We will always feel an emptiness without Him.  Occasionally in seasons we might try swimming in the deeper waters of his love and mercy and we can from time to time find such peace and joy that we hold unto like a great treasure, but when we go totally beyond ourselves and dive into that vast ocean of God's amazing love and never look back we realise not just how wonderful it is but how much more there is to discover.  Just like today, even in this age of knowledge and discovery, there are vast amounts of the deep oceans that have never been explored.  We still don't even know anything about the largest fraction.

So our walk with God here on this earth, we are overcome at first with his love towards us, but as we learn to enter into living in that love day by day we are then overcome with the realisation that we have just begun.  There is so much more once the Word of God begins to come alive to us, it feels like a mighty wave has just been released over us, there is so much - no end - to the revelation that flows.  It is difficult for me to put into words, because I can't think of anything that would begin to compare.  The closest thing I can think of would be a great dam filled to bursting with water.  But once a break in that dam would happen the water would burst through and nothing would be able to stop it.

Salvation is so complete and bursting with such great and glorious love and abundant life that has been stored up for each one of us, that everything in this worldly realm like a dam wall seeks to keep us from discovering.  But when we seek after and run to him through the Holy Spirit we can tap into and breakthrough and find ourselves swept away and out of our depth in his love and abundant life.  I believe the mercy of God allows us to experience step by step and gives time for us to soak in and drink in bit by bit, to allow us to grow and take it all in, otherwise we would drown and be totally overwhelmed.  Many times I hear the Holy Spirit telling me to Breathe, as I sit down to pray I hear this reminder 'Breathe'.  As we adjust our natural minds and bodies into line with our spirit we must learn to breathe deep.  Just like as we dive into deep waters we must be trained to breathe.  Great swimmers are not just trained in using their arms and legs but also their breathing .

What amazes me is that we can go through life for many years and never come to the realisation that every breath we take comes from God.  It is actually God, because everything in existence comes from Him.  He is the very essence of everything.  Our lives belong to him, whether we know it or not.  Many deny the very existence of God, not knowing that he is the one who has given them life.  But as a child of God we know He does exist, but how much more sad is it to never enter into the fulness of this wonderful salvation.  The bible warns us not to neglect the benefits of this wonderful salvation.

As I discover more, I am repentant of not knowing it sooner, I feel like I have wasted to many years. 

Years wasted in anxiousness or sickness when all the time healing and peace was mine in Christ Jesus.  But the great mercy and love of God flows over and washes me clean again and again and says 'I will restore'.  There is much to distract us in life, but I find the more I turn my focus on Jesus the more everything else fades away.  Like the words of that old time chorus 

Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face

and the things of earth will grow strangely dim

in the light of his glory and grace

How often have the people of God sang this and then returned quickly to the cares and burdens of earthly affairs?

It seems like more often we are overcome with the cares of this world than we are overcome with His peace and joy.  The more I have experience of my Saviour, the deeper in love I have fallen.  I am more hungry and thristy for him everyday and in everything.  I know I am not the same as I was 2 years ago, even though the words on the page are the same - BUT they have become my life, my reason to live, my strength, my healing and health. Religion steals away the personal relationship with the Father, through Jesus worked on and stepped out by the Holy Spirit in us, and pushes us to live in and under fear, control and deception.  BUT No-one or No system can replace the personal relationship experience.  Religion only touches the outward parts, but true Salvation touches the deepest parts of our being.

I am so glad that we can come to Jesus just as we are and he then takes us on a great discovery and journey of grace and healing in our lives, step by step and day by day.  

I pray today that whatever season of life you are in, that you will know the Peace of God and you to will take a moment to 'breathe' and take a look back at how far you have come in your walk of faith and acknowledge and praise Him for what He has done for you. x