Following the Narrow Way God issued me with a new challenge this year. I allowed the family subscription to a Daily Devotional expire. I found myself caught up in a curious inertia when it came to ordering more. I prayed about this. What about my children? I have always bought them the devotional to guide their daily time with God. God’s response? I want you to write it. Oh, OK, I am already embarking on a Master’s degree and establishing a new practice this year, both full time jobs in themselves, but if God wants me to add another, what I consider, full time job to the list then why not? As daunting and terrifying as that sounds I have learned to trust God with the burdens He gives me to carry. After all, I completed by Bachelor’s degree a few years ago in His strength. Every subject, every assignment was circled in prayer. So I trust Him to sustain me on this triple journey this year. And I trust Him to give me the words to write because I don’t feel overly well qualified to do this. My concern for my children has been influenced by his own experiences as a young Christian. At the age of 15 I was sitting watcjomg tv with my sister. It was about the different ways people celebrate Christmas. I had been raised going to church every Sunday. I knew my father, who took us every week, did not believe in God. Christianity was a good philosophy to live your life by. As a small child, rejected by my mother and emotionally and physically abused by my father, and bullied at school, I would spend hours every day praying to God over every little thing I was terrified of (and that was virtually everything because nowhere in my life was safe). As a very little girl I remember coming to the realisation that people die and being terrified at the thought of nothingness. My oldest brother got out his pictorial children’s Bible and showed me where it said that if we believed in Jesus we would never die but go to heaven with Him. So I knew and trusted all that, but here I was at 15 thinking I knew better. The program mentioned Christians and I scoffed “God doesn’t exist”. My atheist sister responded “how do you know?” Suddenly I wasn’t in the lounge room anymore. I was in the throne room of God surrounded by a brilliant light and I heard God say “how can you say that, you know I exist” and I did. I was mortified at the thought of having denied God. I never did that again. Now I had a faith. Where could I go to develop that faith? My family were not able to do that. The church my family had attended was in turmoil. So I went with friends to church. But there was no discipleship there, no instruction on what to do next. I completed school and went off to study nursing. Suddenly I was working Sundays and not able to get to church. I tried to read my Bible every day and pray, but I had instruction on where to go and found myself getting caught up in the world. I still kept my faith. I just wasn’t a great disciple. Eventually I got tired of reading the Bible. Back then there were no Christian bookshops with handy devotionals. When my husband and I were expecting our first child we decided we had to get back to church so we went to a local church. It was quite nice but no discipleship. We moved out of the area and after a number of different churches found one that ran a discipleship course. That was good but discipleship stopped at the end of the course. We have never found another church that offers education in discipleship. A few years ago I asked God where the new believers I was praying to come could go for discipleship. Now I have the answer. If we want new believers to be discipled then we have to do it ourselves. So I am writing a devotional for my children, taking them along the path of discipleship and sharing it with you, because I think it is always good to remind ourselves of Jesus call on us.
Posted on: Wed, 21 Jan 2015 06:32:48 +0000
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