|
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. - 2 Corinthians 5:17
The normal progression of life is infancy, adolescence, adulthood, senior years, and eventually returning home to spend eternity with our Heavenly Father. I call these stages of life. If everyone lives long enough, they will go through these stages and have remarkably similar experiences while in each stage. Sharing these experiences is what brings us together in community with others. COS has been that community for me for the past 38 years!
Many years ago, I went through the very meaningful Stephens Ministry Training at COS. One of the first exercises was to do our own personal lifelines, documenting the ups and downs of our life. The ups were easy to document; however, the downs were not. But it is the down times I now consider the New Chapters in my life. For each time I experienced a down time, I had to find a way to survive it and go on, thus starting a New Chapter. After recording and rethinking my lifeline, I started to examine how I did it, what brought me through the darkness that those events caused and what I learned from it.
One of my New Chapters started at a retreat for separated and divorced individuals. I was stuck in the “Oh woe is me!” phase, thinking I was the only one to ever go through this rejection and deceit - how was I ever going to do this? I had a 6-year-old and a 7- month-old to take care of on my own. It was at this retreat, during a time of individual meditation, that I felt arms envelope me and heard the words, “You will never be alone, I will always be with you!” I know that was the Lord reassuring me that I could weather this, and that I could rely on Him to see me through it. To this day, I do the everyday things knowing that God is with me, but when I face a major issue, death of a loved one, health issues, loss of a job, etc., I know it is a New Chapter and that God will be there to get me through it!
Think of the disciples who left their families, jobs, and everything they knew to follow Jesus. Then they see him crucified and put in a tomb, only to rise again as he said he would. That sacrifice of his life assures me and you that he will be with us always, through every up and down and New Chapter we experience.
Heavenly Father, thank you for always being there through every up and down in our lives. It is your love that gets us through the New Chapters of Life. Thank you for bringing me to Christ Our Shepherd and its loving community! Amen
| 
