This afternoon, I was inspired to write this reflection.
"Take Up Your Cross and Follow Me"
Some of us may have wrong perception about this verse including me.
We thought by following Jesus, we will live suffering with lots of life problems for eg sickness, marriage, workplace, family, relationship problems, financial crisis etc.
Then, doesn't it contradict with His promises to give us abundant life
Again, we may have wrong perception about this abundant life.
Some may thought that by following Jesus we will have lots of blessings in terms of material blessings, richness and wealth, we could have many properties, unlimited travelling, retired early etc.
Even, some prosperity gospels preach about this kind of material blessings when we follow Jesus.
As I've pondered and encountered His great love, The Holy Spirit gave me a wisdom about all these meanings.
Suffering means we die for our human nature.
Everyday we make small death in ourselves.
For eg,
In the morning, instead of scrolling down social media, reading unsettling news that make us anxious and angry, we could use this time to pray, read the word of God.
Instead of watching Korean Drama who may distort the truth about love, we could make use the time watching the live of Saints to understand the truth about love.
Instead of splurging our money to feed our personal interests, we could donate it to those who really need it
Instead of spending too much time in our work chasing power and promotion and neglecting our spouse and children, we could leave those work in the office and spend more time with our family at home
Instead of having fun in the party looking for distraction and temporary happiness, we could use our time to gather with our friends in the cell group or community to find everlasting happiness together.
Instead of taking revenge or hate the persons who hurt us, we could offer forgiveness to them as God forgive us.
Those are small deaths that we could do in daily life. It's really hard when we fight against our human nature, but if we surrender our life, our mind, our heart to God, He will empower us to do His will.
When we sacrifice ourselves, make small death, we will find life in Jesus as He promised.
Abundant life doesn't mean richness and wealth in worldly terms, but it's everlasting happiness, peace and joy that world cannot give.
When we won something, having big orders, receive bonus or pay increments, yes we may be happy but it lasts for a day.
We may have forgotten the feeling on the next day and we will franctically looking for another happiness. Our heart is restless to look for something to satisfy our souls.
But when we encounter God's love, we could say we have found treasures and we are willing to leave everything for this treasure.
In my own experience, since I found this Kingdom of Heaven and experienced peace and joy that the world cannot give, my life has changed.
My relationship with my spouse has changed tremendously, I felt loved by him as I am loved by God. Our communication has improved much much more better, by God's grace and love, we could accept each other flaws, weaknesses, we could sympathise with each other.
Not only that, my relationship with the children has improved far more better.
My children's obedient has shoot up almost 100%, they felt loved and behave very well.
Everyday, when I wake up, I feel peace and God's presence.
He always be with me each moment and provide whatever I need even in the trivial matter.
I could say our father prayer with conviction especially the part
"Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, give us today our daily bread"
I have no more worry about tomorrow and the future because I believe in God that He will provide for us if we cooperate with Him, obey His commandments and do His will.
There are times that I fail, give in to temptation and sin against God.
The feeling was like Hell, it's dark inside, I felt numb, lost, asked Him where are you ?
Sin is really devastating, it's breaking our relationship with God. Our image about God becomes distorted and we couldn't trust Him 100% anymore and slowly we let our human nature take control and we drifted apart from God.
Until I humbly ask for His forgiveness, His peace and joy overshadow me again.
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