Jesus Calling- April 3, 2014
" IN ME YOU HAVE EVERYTHING. In Me you are complete. Your capacity to experience Me is increasing, through
My removal of debris and clutter from your heart."
Every morning I have a comforting routine. I fix my first cup of coffee, and I sit down and read from my devotional, Jesus Calling. There's a daily message, compiled from scripture, that is the focus for my day. It's almost as if God whispers to me... "Here's what I want you to concentrate on... Please, PAY ATTENTION."
Now I say "Please" because the God I know and love and serve has good manners. Yet PAY ATTENTION is in capital letters because capitals in an email mean that someone is shouting. I have no doubt that the Lord God Almighty might feel He needs to shout at me from time-to-time. He might even wonder, if God wonders, what will it take to help her "get" this message. "I am talking to YOU, Linda Marie! Yes, YOU!"
He was surely talking just to me in the April 3rd message from Jesus Calling. After all, on March 27th I had written a post called What Spring Cleaning and Lent Have in Common. In that post I asked God to de-clutter my heart. And since March 27th I have asked over and over again...
"Dear Lord,
What needs to be removed from my heart? What needs to be de-cluttered? Love, Linda"
And yesterday my answer came through loud and clear....
"Oh my child, I'm glad you asked. You already know the answer to this question, but I'll say it again. You need to remove all anger and bitterness from your heart. All of it."
Love, God
And I started to cry.
I knew it was true. Some deep hurts have surfaced lately. Some tough memories have replayed in my brain. Some unexpected opportunities have come my way to work on forgiveness...to show forgiveness, not just talk about it.
One of my greatest life-lesson about forgiveness, or refusing to forgive, came yesterday in a quotation I found on a blog. I may be the only one this speaks to, but its message pierced my heart. It said...
"When you don't forgive someone, you let them park
in your life forever."
So today I am focusing on gratitude and cleaning out the parking lot of my life. I'm de-cluttering the cars, and there are lots of old cars there. I've let them park there and they are taking up time and space and peace. It feels like the Lord is the valet service attendant, "Yes, what car may I get for you?"
And I'll choose to drive each one of them out of the parking lot of my heart! I will choose to know, in my deepest heart-of-hearts that I am complete in Him. In Him, I have EVERYTHING.
I am not in this alone.
God Bless!
Love, Linda
2 comments:
Linda,
What a wonderful message.
Nita Jardee ( Martin)
Thanks, I really needed to read this! When unexpected hurts from the past haunt us, I find it hard to forgive and yet I know I must. When Satan tries to throw curve balls into current situations, it is hard to trust God and know he already knows the outcome, and we wonder what we should do or say to the people who were deeply hurt, even tho we were not the ones who said or did the incident that caused the hurt. My prayer is that God will show me what he wants me to do!
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