Good News

Isaiah 31:9  These people are like children who lie and refuse to obey; they refuse to listen to the Lord's teachings.

10  They tell the seers, "Don't see any more visions!"  They say to the prophets, "Don't tell us the truth!  Say things that will make us feel good; see only good things for us.  11  Stop blocking our path.  Get out of our way.  Stop telling us about God, the Holy One of Israel."

12  So this is what the Holy One of Israel says:  "You people have refused to accept this message and have depended on cruelty and lies to help you.  13  You are guilty of these things.  So you will be like a high wall with cracks in it that falls suddenly and breaks into small pieces..."

This takes me back to the time before I called myself a Christian.  I did not want to listen to anyone.  I didn't want to hear the truth, the truth of Scripture or the truth about how I was living my life.  I did not want to hear the truth about how misled I was or how I was not living in line with the Bible.  I was living in the world and I was just fine with that.

Something changed when I walked into the doors of Genesis church, after being invited there by my sister.  God met me there.  I felt Him.  I heard the message, the Good News of Jesus.  I learned that He came down from Heaven in human form, to live a sinless life, and then sacrifice Himself on the cross for my sin.  I learned that He was resurrected from death, to prove His deity, that He is God and to show that He has overcome death for us.  I learned that this Truth, this Good News could set me free.  And it did.  I might have known some of the story before, but it never lived in my heart.  I never felt the weightiness of it until that day.

While free (from the fear of death and the hold of this world and the American dream, among other things), that did not mean all of my struggles and bad decisions stopped.  Changes happened, growth occurred, but slowly and over time.  It continues still, as I am sure it will till the day I meet Jesus.  There are still so many things I see about myself that I want to change.  I know I have to give Jesus the driver's seat for that to happen.  I need to continue to love and serve Him, and get to know Him through His Word and with the help of others wiser, more studied, and more practiced than I am.

I know I have to listen to the "seers" and the "prophets," those who are teaching me what it means to strive after Christ, to allow the Holy Spirit to live within me, and to let go of "what makes me feel good" for the bigger picture of what is true, right, and most of all, to live grace-filled and grace-giving.