Monday Morning Ponderings...

Yesterday my husband, newly turned 40, shared a sermon titled,

Ponder the Path of Your Feet.

He told us to ponder from Proverbs 4:20-27:

1. That there is a path we each will journey on
2. We get to choose the path we journey on
3. Each of our two path options has a destination
4. We have been given all the tools we need for life and godliness so we will be without excuse if we get to the destination and it is not life for all of eternity.

He also encouraged us to lay aside every weight that easily besets us. Sometimes even good things can weigh us down and distract us from running the race wholly. It can be things like:

1. technology
2. food
3. friends

If any of these things are bigger to us than just a help/encouragement in our race for eternal life, then we need to lay them aside to where they take second place to God.

I had to do this with food. For years, I lived with addictions to certain foods and it was hindering my life and creating poor health. God increased my knowledge on these things and I had to choose to lay aside these things because they were making me sick and were not helping me to productively fulfill the task His wisdom assigned me.

I also have recently implemented an 'unplugged' day where I go off the internet for a full 24 hours. Amazing moments of reading and being encouraged in quiet time with God are happening and I LOVE IT! I feel that technology has its place, but sometimes it can creep up on a person and be a distraction to pull them into passivity and even cause them to miss what they might not have if they were not distracted. I had alot of time to journal and ponder and pray, to read and also do little household projects on my unplugged day and I loved it.

Friends are a good thing and have meant the world to me, but they also have been used as distractions for me too. God has had to, on more than one occasion, pull the prop of friends out from under me so that I rely totally on Him for help and strength to live the life He called me to live. Don't get me wrong: I love my friends still, but I love God more!

The sermon was finished with the testimony that he wants to finish well, and that he hopes that is the goal of us all. In order to finish well, we need to follow the Master wholly. We have to be intensely interested in His Way of things and imitate Him.

Overcomers are promised a place in the Kingdom of Life eternally. It behooves us then, to overcome because, by the power of Jesus, overcoming is certainly possible! Sure not easy, and we need to constantly be on guard because there are many obstacles:

1. our selfish nature
2. wolves hiding in sheep's clothing INSIDE the churches
3. plenty

I was encouraged as I sat and listened to this man I love deeply (currently the oldest person in our church) sharing his reflections on turning 40. I was blessed to reflect on where God has brought us and a hope rose in my heart that He will continue the work He already began in us and will complete it...

When the son of Man comes back to the earth, shall He find faith here? I so desire that it will be so!

Happy Monday to you all.
Love,
Marcia

Each Step I Take

(we sang this song after the sermon yesterday,

and my heart was so encouraged)