I love a good quote. It sticks with me for days, months, sometimes years. I ponder it, rolling it around in my brain while figuring out how it applies to my life. In college, I even started a “quote document” so I could literally copy and paste quotes that I came across so I could easily access them. I know. #nerd. Last night, the hubs and I were watching one of our favorite tv shows, and a line that the main characters said hit me like a punch to the gut. The exchange went like this: “You didn’t kill her. She died saving your life.” “In saving my life, she conferred a value on it that is a currency I do not know how to spend.” As a long-time follower of Christ, if I am being honest, one of the things I take for granted the most is the fact that Jesus died for me. He died to save my eternal life. Last night, I watched a story where the man stumbles under the weighted truth that someone died so he could live. By very nature of the action, this sacrifice shows the person dying places invaluable worth on the person being saved. In essence, then, it’s a two-sided truth. First, someone died so that you can live. Second, your life has enough value to warrant someone’s death. When we re-frame this exchange in light of salvation for eternity, we see just how much grace exists in salvation. First, someone died so that I can live. Actually no… not just “someone”, JESUS. Jesus died so I can live. Jesus, the Creator & Sustainer of the universe DIED so I can live. Second, your life has enough value to warrant someone’s death. Actually NO, no it doesn’t! My life doesn’t have enough value to warrant Jesus Christ’s death. Jesus is God. I am not. Jesus is perfect. I am not. I could keep going but I feel like those first two comparisons are more than enough to make the point. But to top it all off, here’s what’s so staggering, Jesus loved me enough to say my life is worth dying for. Um, what? Romans 5:6-11 explains it better than I can. When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good. But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation. For since our friendship with God was restored by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be saved through the life of his Son. So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God. I cannot read that account of God’s lavish love and not be overwhelmed. I understand the character’s question. When faced with such love and sacrifice, how do I spend this currency of a life when it cost someone else a value I can’t comprehend? It’s a question we should ask. But I’m finding the answer is simple. We live. Jesus didn’t die on the Cross to provide me with eternal salvation for me to sit on the sidelines as life passes by. He places a value on my life, some might say a calling, and He simply says “walk worthy of it.” {Eph 4:1} That’s how I can show him my gratitude. How I can show my sincerity. Walk worthy. It’s the only way to live with the value conferred to my life.
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What is it about January 1st of a new year that we decide the world is our oyster and we can dream impossible dreams and climb to new heights? What is so magical about the change from December 31st to January 1st that we go from dismal “I’m a failure at life” to “I’m going to be the next superhero and change the world?”
I have a roller coaster relationship with new year’s resolutions. I did them for a while after college and then felt that they didn’t actually inspire any change in my life and so I stopped making them. Then I got married and my husband is a believer in “new year = new goals”, so I started doing them again, albeit skeptically. However, as we planned our new goals for 2017 and looked back at our goals for 2016, I realized that setting new year’s resolutions was actually helpful for me. I actually accomplished most of my new year’s resolutions in 2016 which led me to ponder what brought about that change. After years of yo-yoing on new year’s resolutions, why are they finally working? I think it’s three factors. 1. I had to decide that I was done with unrealistic dreams. I was ready to accomplish something which means being honest about what works and what doesn’t. For me, that involved setting schedules and developing habits. Take for example, exercise. I’m not someone who wakes up at 5am and goes to the gym. So rather than set that as a goal and then fail year after year, I’m changing the goal so that I still accomplish the end result but in my own way. I exercise in the evenings. Do I still wish I could bound out of bed in the wee hours of the morning? Yep! But I’ve realized I’m not one for bounding so instead let’s make realistic new year’s goals and then be able to be successful! Sometimes admitting that you won’t be able to do something is the best way to start completing the bigger goal! 2. I had to accept the reality of change. I don’t actually become a different person in the hours I’m asleep between the end of last year and the beginning of a new one. I’m still the same old me! Which means I’m not going to suddenly have new abilities and disciplines to accomplish all my dreams in 2017. Instead it means that I need to understand effective change happens step by step. We all know the parable of the tortoise and the hare and the take-away being “slow and steady wins the race.” But I think we call admit that fast and furious change is way more exciting and what we prefer! Well last month I watched a video on YouTube where they actually put a tortoise and hare in a race. And guess what? The hare left the tortoise in its tracks… until half-way down the lane, the hare became distracted by something in the stands…and wouldn’t you know, slowly but surely, that tortious plodded on and crossed the finish line first! Maybe that’s why nutritionists say its’ better to lose small amounts of weight weekly than tons of weight all at once…. Hmmm… it’s all making sense now! The reality of change means taking things slow and seeing long-term transformation rather than the instant gratification that is fleeting and underdeveloped. 3. I had to value the importance of a deadline. I was always critical about setting goals year by year. I felt that if a goal was worth accomplishing then I shouldn’t take an entire year for it, or it shouldn’t be something that ends after one year! I’m realizing now that I totally missed the point of yearly resolutions. It’s actually not about the length of time as much as it is about a deadline. At least for me (and probably a lot of other people too), we work better knowing there’s a due date for our tasks. I do laundry because I have a deadline (my deadline being when we run out of clean underwear). I cook because I have a deadline driven by my hunger. I get things done at work by prioritizing them on their deadlines. See the common thread? Deadlines are there to help us be productive and work on our tasks, projects, or goals. I had to start seeing December 31st as a deadline to work towards rather than a random date used for traditions. Deadlines drive productivity. So this year, I’ve made my resolutions and I’m actually excited about working on them because they’re actually doable and I will better myself by accomplishing them. 2017 I’m coming for you! Who’s with me? |
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