God Makes All Things New
My mom said at the beginning of 2022, “2022 God makes all things new”. Oh man, I didn’t know how real that statement would be. Before this year I was a Christian but a lukewarm Christian. Even though God brought me through brain surgery, and cancer, and blessed me with a season of health I still was just half in half out on my faith. Still went out on the weekends to the bar, got drunk, only read my Bible occasionally, and was not a light in a dark world pointing back to the Creator. Well, in 2022, God decided to rebuild the altar of commitment in my life.
What I mean by “alter of commitment” is Elijah the prophet of the Old Testament in the Bible was sent to Israel who was worshipping false gods (1 Kings 18:20-40). The people of Israel had religion without commitment. Religion without relation. Elijah repaired the altar of the Lord that had been torn down. He built this by setting up 12 stones for the 12 tribes of Israel. With the stones, he built an altar in the name of the Lord for the pursuit of righteousness back in the people.
That’s how 2022 felt. I rebuilt my altar of commitment to Jesus. I gave up drinking, going out, and the party scene. IlGod became my best friend. I began reading my Bible every day getting encouragement from it and seeing my life change before my eyes. I started gaining spiritual maturity and craved reading my Bible for more insight. I got to the point in my health I couldn’t even walk and had to rely on God for strength and mercy every day, and He gave it to me abundantly in my life. He gave me a Kingdom perspective, that our lives are very short on earth and I’ll have eternity with a perfect body.
It is humbling to have to use a walker to get around and not being able to go places because of stomach pain and not being able to walk well. God showed me I didn’t need as much as I always thought I did. God showed me my identity was in Him alone. “He has accepted Gods estimate of his own life. He knows he is as weak and helpless as God has declared him to be, but paradoxically he knows at the same time that he is in the sight of God of more importance than angels, in himself nothing, in God, everything. That is his motto. He knows well that the world will never see him as God sees him and has stopped caring. He rests perfectly content to allow God to place His own value.” (A.W. Tozer)
God's going to provide for you everything you need. Like I said, I realized I needed a lot less than what I had always thought I needed. Paul in the New Testament said “a thorn in my flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to torment me so that I would not exalt myself. Concerning this I pleaded with the Lord three times that it would leave me. But He said to me,’My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness.’ Therefore I will most gladly boast all the more about my weaknesses, so that Christs power may reside in me. So I take pleasure in weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecution, and in difficulties for the sake of Christ. For when I am weak then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12: 7-10). When I am weak than I am strong. My strength is found in God.
