Moving On...

They say old habits die hard. I think we can say old affections also die hard.
Just recently I had to deal with the old affections of my heart. I really thought I had forgotten them, killed them, buried them, never to see them again. But that was only a dream. A delusion of some sort. They didn't go away, they had only morphed into something else.

In case you're wondering, I'm talking about those fantasies, dreams of the type of man I always thought I'd end up with. I'm talking about the impressions old boyfriends and crushes have left on me. I think every daughter of Eve have them to some degree. I surely got my fair share of them. I fantasied and day-dreamt. I panted and crushed hard. I was border-line chasing these crushes if it came to it. As for the old flames, we were through but as with any experience we have in life, they inevitably left an impression on me. so what does a girl do with all these when she meets a great guy who wants to pursue marriage with her?

What I did was to just bury them alive. I just shoved them deep somewhere within my soul without asking God for help on what to do. The crazy thing is that these suckers know how to change appearance and come back to life so you won't even suspect. It starts out innocent but it's the little foxes I tell you! So instead of guarding my heart, I start to indulge in a little conversation here with a guy I had feelings for, or just a little imagination of what my life would have been without Mr. And that's how it starts. Until one day I'm on the verge of ruining a really good work that God is doing in my life.

Proverbs 14:1 teaches us that a wise woman builds her home but a foolish woman tears it down. I certainly was walking in the footsteps of the foolish woman by not watching what I dwell on. So what did I do? I asked God for help. What was the answer? Die to yourself. Check this verse out:

"I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone. But its death will produce many new kernels—a plentiful harvest of new lives." John 12:24

So if I want a new life that will produce a plentiful harvest of new lives, I have to forget what is behind, die to myself and reach for what is ahead. What is your story?

A True Father

---Excerpt from Fathered by God by John Eldredge

Jesus kept coming back to this central issue, over and over, driving at it in his teachings, his parables, his penetrating questions. If you look again, through the lens that most of us feel fundamentally fatherless, I think you'll find it very close indeed to the center of Jesus' mission. "Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake?" (Matt. 7:9-10 NIV). Well? We rush ahead to the rest of the passage, but I think Jesus is asking us a real question and he wants a real answer. I expect he paused here, his penetrating, compassionate eyes scanning the listeners before him. Well? I hesitate. I guess you're right. I wouldn't, and apart from the exceptionally wicked man, I can't think of any decent father-even if he is self absorbed-who would do such a thing. Jesus continues, "If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!" (v. 11 NIV).

He is trying to speak to our deepest doubt about the universe.

Look at the birds of the air. Consider the lilies in the field. Are you not much more valuable to your true Father than they? (Matt 6:26, 28). Hmmm. I'm not sure how to answer. I mean, of course, there's the "right" answer. And then there is the wound in our hearts toward fatherhood, and there is also the way our lives have gone. "What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off?" (Matt. 18:12 NIV). Yet another question, pressing into the submerged fears in our hearts, another question wanting another answer. Well? Wouldn't he? "And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost" (vv. 13-14 NIV).Wherever you are in your ability to believe it at this moment in your life, at least you can see what Jesus is driving at. You have a good Father. He is better than you thought. He cares. He really does. He's kind and generous. He's out for your best.