Holding onto your empty cards?
Dear Friends,
Through the years I’ve been given quite a few Starbucks gift cards. I’m not a coffee drinker so I’ve been collecting them. Recently I started a mentoring relationship with another woman who loves coffee so we meet at … Starbucks.
Nowhere on the card, does it tell you how much it is worth. Even using it doesn’t really let you know either.
The only ways to find out is to either call the number on the back of the card or ask the server for a receipt after using it. This week I gave the server one card, but it wasn’t enough to cover our order. I added another card but it too wasn’t enough to cover the rest of the balanced owed. The third card finally finished the payment. The server asked if I wanted to keep the old cards … whatever for????
What would happen if when this life (your life) had run out—was used up—you could be given another life and then just carry on living????? Sounds rather easy, doesn’t it?
That is just what Jesus did for us. He bought us a new life, a better life, a fuller-bodied, more satisfying, everlasting life. He bought it by using his life as payment. And he is offering it to YOU. This new life is not just for the future but can be lived immediately, today!! All you have to do is give up your depleted, worthless, empty life – and if you are honest with yourself that is what life is without making Jesus a part of it – and let God activate this new life in you through his Holy Spirit.
2 Corinthians 5:15-17 (NLT)
He [Jesus] died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live for themselves. Instead, they will live for Christ, who died and was raised for them.
So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
2 Corinthians 5:14-17 (The Message)
Our firm decision is to work from this focused center: One man died for everyone. That puts everyone in the same boat. He included everyone in his death so that everyone could also be included in his life, a resurrection life, a far better life than people ever lived on their own.
Because of this decision we don’t evaluate people by what they have or how they look. We looked at the Messiah that way once and got it all wrong, as you know. We certainly don’t look at him that way anymore. Now we look inside, and what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. The old life is gone; a new life burgeons
I remember when I first accepted Jesus’ offer of a new life. It came with peace and joy and a heart of thanksgiving. It also came with the challenge of daily letting go of my old life. It’s so easy to keep carrying around the old used up cards, even though they don’t work. I think that is one reason I feel so strongly about taking the Freedom Session – a Christ centered healing journey designed for people who are ready to take a step towards freedom and healing – and offering it to the rest of Northview and our community. And am I ever learning how to let go of my old life!!!!
Anyways, I pray that this will be the year you receive Jesus’ offer of a new life. If you want someone to talk with about this or if you want information about Freedom Session, let me know .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Blessings from Bev
#1 from lornewel on March 12, 2010
In my lifetime as an evangelical, I have seen and heard a lot more about “accepting Christ” than about making and being made disciples. Paul has quite a bit to say about putting off the old nature, old life and old ways and putting on the new, although in his epistles the “how to” is a bit thin.
Your blog, Bev, brought to mind the account of Jesus raising Lazarus. By his word, Jesus called forth Lazarus from the dead and from the tomb. He had new life but came out still bound in grave clothes. Jesus did not speak those off him, nor did he tell Lazarus himself to “put off” those entanglements of his former dead state. The text (John 11) says his hands and feet and face were bound. (There’s a 3-point sermon just lying there to be picked up!) Rather, Jesus told his disciples, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
When we receive new life in Christ it is wonderful. But I think all of us are still bound with various kinds of graveclothes and need our fellow disciples to untie them under the direction of Jesus the life-giver. I have seen some pretty flaky approaches to inner healing, but that does not mean we do not all need it.