I turn the page, calendar blank as a new year begins.
A new year filled with days yet to be lived, time waiting for the light of eternity to meet the moment.
What will be? How will I live? What will I choose?
My soul keeps seeking, yearning, submitting…
Longing to know more.
My soul reaches for the real, life that fills, and love that redeems.
Saturate me with Your Spirit, Lord.
Teach me to worship You with all that I am and all that I have.
Sometimes I am afraid to let go,
Holding on to bits and pieces, afraid to give up my rights and plans.
Back and forth, my soul struggles between faith and flesh,
Between His peace and my striving.
As I worship, the transforming work of God restores my soul.
I open more and more of myself and roots of faith grow deep…
I lay my life down
And I give it again, and again, and again–
offering all of my heart.
All.
Trusting God is everything.
He is every answer that I seek,
The provision for every need that I have,
The source of every blessing I receive,
And the Giver of every good gift that graces my life.
Gratitude flows through an open heart–
Open to receive, letting go comes easier.
Surrender strengthens me to release the incessant demands to prove myself.
I open my hands to hold onto God and let Him lead.
Too many days the grasp of my soul was afraid to trust fully,
Letting go felt like a loss rather than an opportunity, a sacrifice rather than a gift.
Learning to live fully in all who God is,
To live loud a vibrant life of faith in Christ…
This is the work of the believer
And the growth of a lifetime.
As Truth strengthens my soul,
I come to realize that confidence to draw near to God,
Courage to love vibrant and free is based on His faithfulness,
Not on my ability, purity, or goodness…
How long it takes to get this lesson learned…all the way, soul deep and life strong.
This year, let me live a life that worships with the opportunity of each moment.
As I learn to lay my treasures at God’s feet
I begin to stop defining myself with the stark lines of
What I can do, how I look, how well…how much…
When I see myself by these self-expectations the reflection is never accurate
and it is never…ever…enough.
The blessings and gifts of God are not standards to measure and evaluate.
They are meant to be used by a heart set free
From the chains of performance, approval, control, and perfection..
There is nothing more beautiful
than a heart fully surrendered to God.
This is my prayer and this is my life-song as I step into this year.
Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.–Romans 12:1-2 The Message
This post is adapted from a post that originally appeared at www.gingerharrington.com in the Soul Strength series.
Ginger Harrington, social media coordinator for Planting Roots, also writes at her award-winning website. She has also written military themed posts for Guideposts Military Blog and (in)courage. Ginger and her retired Marine husband have enjoyed twenty-four years of military life and are parents to three young adults.
