Nothing To Lose

  
  Who has the most joy in their life; the person who has everything to lose, or the person who has nothing to lose?  When an individual has many possessions and is comfortable, he or she has a hard time making any kind of change in their lives. They are afraid to lose everything. Compare this to someone who has decided that they don't need everything and that God knows better what is required in their lives.

     There is a secret to having Joy in your life and it does not involve possessions, careers, money or feeling busy. On the contrary, it often involves losing all of these things, not because they are bad in themselves, but because they create the idea that a person has done something themselves and God can not work through someone who is leading their own way.

     There is a line in a song by the Newsboys that says, "you say I'm living like a beggar; I call it killing the fool."  I love this line because we must all constantly "kill the fool." The fool is the part of us that wants to look like "someone," the person who wants to be noticed either for who we are or what we've done. When we get rid of the fool, we are open to whatever God wants to do in our lives. We have gotten rid of all our expectations of what out lives should look like or what we will become. We have nothing to lose because we have already laid it at the foot of the cross.

     When God puts a call on your life, can you easily say "Yes, Lord," or do you argue and tell him why it is impossible? I encourage you to get rid of all the superfluous parts that have no eternal value and become a person who has nothing to lose.

                 BE THE ONE

The seed, the plant and the fruit.

    

       
                "May our sons flourish in their youth like well-nurtured plants." Psalm 144: 12     

      I've been in the garden a lot this summer with my adopted son. He loves growing plants. He loves the planting and the picking and even the weeding. When we first started showing him how to garden, he was amazed that the little seeds ended up to be big plants. The kernels of corn grow to ears with silk attached. Radishes are small specks and grow quickly. Flowers are the same way. A small hand is large compared to the tiny grains of life that develop into beautiful colors.
   
     I realized recently that we are the same way with out children. We see them when they are small and we think we know what they will look like when they are grown.  We see a bean seed and think we know, "our child will be a bean, of course."  However, God has the blueprint and often what our children will become is not what we image. Over the last 22 years of being a parent, I have been amazed and surprised to see what my children have developed into. Their interests are varied: from hockey and calculus to dance and Shakespeare. From journalism and baseball to horses and soccer.
   
     As parents of children we haven't birthed, I think we do more watching than expecting. We don't have genetics to go from, so we pay more attention to their interests. Sometimes we, knowing their past, try and steer them away from certain things.  We need to remember that their interests come from God and he is the one growing them. We can never truly know what the final result will be: what God is creating for His glory.  

     We must remember that God uses everything. He uses the earthworm and the rain, the sun and the minerals from rocks to raise up for himself  "well-nurtured plants." We then only need to tend them; to make sure they get enough water and that the sun does not wither them. We need to keep out the harmful pests and sometimes stake them next to a strong support so that they will grow tall
 
      Once the plant is grown, there should also be fruit; however, sometimes the fruit takes years to grow. The apple tree planted won't produce fruit for many seasons. The watermelon may look ripe on the outside but on the inside it is still undeveloped and needing many days to ripen. It takes patience to be a gardener and it takes patience to be a parent especially an adoptive parent. Praise God that he is patient with us and that he is not finished with me (or the children given to me) yet.

                    Be The One