Tanya,
I read late into the evening and one of the things I read was an essay in Christianity Today. The author spoke of what it is to be a true devotee of Christ. He said unless we have given over ourselves to be totally reborn, seeking to serve others and God, then we have not truly repented. Service to others is the key phrase here. He said we cannot know the joy of true Christianity if we do not make serving a priority of our life. I have always felt a void in my heart. Before accepting Christ it was huge. I tried to fill it with alcohol and sin of all natures. Yet it just grew. I thought that when I accepted Christ it would go away. It hasn't. It's still there, an emptiness that isn't fillable. I know what it is now that can fill it. Serving. Just going to church and singing, paying tithes, etc. will never fill it. I have been so bitter in my heart at how little I get from reading the Bible, singing praises, worshiping. I'm not living a Christian life, I'm acting one. Sure I try to keep a clean mind, I try not to curse, I try to think well of others but nothing satisfies.
The void comes from not serving. I don't mean serving in some church function. I mean serving everyone, you, family, community, in the workplace. I know that I've failed miserably as a Christian. I was on fire until it was quenched by the church. No, not on fire, I was beginning to burn and the embers died there.
I believe you also have a big void. I also believe you haven't answered the call to serve. How many times have you put away the urge to bake something for the old lady across the street or whatever?
I read that your past, which God hated, can be turned into something He loves by using the knowledge you've learned and ministering from it as a base.
So many people are hurting yet all we think about are our own pains. If we only worry about ourselves getting into heaven we've missed the point completely. Jesus, in everything He did, showed someone else the way to salvation. He came to serve. We serve ourselves. That's why we can not keep from falling prey to Satan at every turn. We are weak because we still plan our plans instead of following His plan which is simple to state...
(Serve God and your brother)...but hard to implement...
(forsake ourselves).
I think of the flower. It stays rooted in one place. It doesn't do anything other than what God intended it to do. It doesn't try to make itself glorious and radiant as we humans do. It depends upon God. It turns toward God(the Sun, Son)and as God shines His radiance down upon the flower it soaks God's radiance up and in the flower we see reflected back, that beauty. I have not been a flower that gives its beauty so freely. Because I've not looked to the Son at every opportunity. Even on the cloudy days a flower waits for God to shine into it a warmth that revives. If I haven't soaked up the glory when God is at His brightest in my life I'll not have the strength to endure the cloudy days.
I looked to you as someone who had gone to church so much more than I and I saw someone who had the same weaknesses and I've been angry because I wanted you to help me grow. That was wrong. I should have not put that on someone who has had as many travesties as you. You need someone to look to as much as I.
I want to be a server, do you? Can you? Will you try? As for me, I start right away. I don't know what or how, but I'm looking towards God so I can be a flower.
Frank
By Frank Mross
(Frank wrote this to his mom the night before she passed away in November 1991. It was read at her funeral)
Dear Lord,
It's one a.m. and from the foot of her hospital bed I watch my mother's labored breathing, as she clings to life one shallow breath at a time. Already she has stayed in this world many months past her doctor's expectations. And now, as she lies here fighting the ravaging disease inside her she is once again defying the odds, enduring beyond the 24 hours given her several days ago. But Lord, You know that is not unusual for mother. Mother's life has been a series of endurance test and through out her life, from childhood through her final years, she's shown an extraordinary perseverance over adversity.
As I sit in the subtle glow of her half-lit room in the hours of morning with only the sound of her breathing for company, my mind goes back to those days when as a child I and my sisters would accompany her to the fields to work. We would complain and grumble. But we also knew that all of our protest were falling on deaf ears, for we knew that mother had determined that we were all to work hard in order to earn enough that we might have school shoes. What we didn't realize was that during those long hours spent every summer for so many years, mother was suffering from high blood pressure and heart disease. As the years passed we finally left the cotton and rice fields. Mother moved to town and became a cook. Once more she would work hard for long hours, even as she suffered with a failing body. Finally, too many taxing hours of labor brought her to the surgeon who replaced parts of her damaged heart. His long-term prognosis was that her heart would last for 8 to 10 years. Eleven years later she developed cancer of her liver.
Now as she lies here, I watch an artery pulsate strongly in her frail neck, her over-extended heart pumping forcefully. And even near the end she shows remarkable strength and seems determined to breath even when it seems like it's totally past being possible. I marvel at her determination.
Mother's faith in you God has always been inspiring to me. When crisis after crisis came down upon her, she always trusted in You to deliver. When she could yet speak from her hospital bed, her words were of praise toward You. She repeatedly asked for entrance into Heaven. My prayers are for hers to be answered Lord. Let her struggles be over. Let her rest Lord. She has fought and persevered, and all the time with a profound faith in You. Please Lord, take her home.
