I am a creature of habit. I eat the same things for breakfast and lunch. I have the same pattern for each night before bed. I walk the same way every day. Thinking about it, it may seem boring, but I don’t have to think about those things. However, I have a little animal that relies on my schedule too. She knows when I get up and what I will do next. She knows the shoes I wear to take her out for her walk. However, we have had some little traumas with coyotes lately on different parts of our walk which requires her to stop, turn, and look to see if the coyote is still in the same place as four weeks ago.
Usually, it’s not. Today we had a coyote cross right in front of us. She looked back at me as if to say, see? See? This is why I have trauma. So, we will add another page or stop and turn to our book. I wish this didn’t preach to me as it does. We each have things that have happened to us, traumas that have left scars. When circumstances cross our paths that are similar to past traumas, we have a tendency to look back and keep staring at what happened.
What if the same thing happens again? What if I go through it again? You know what that “it” is for you.
Here’s what I am learning in meditating on 1 John. First, John says to our hearts, I’ve seen him. I’ve touched him. I’ve heard his voice. I know him. You know him if you keep his commands and teachings. So that means walking in the light as he is in the light. There is absolutely no darkness in him AT ALL. So, I speak to you and to my heart, friend, walk in the light. Walk in the truth. We can believe the words of John and God’s presence.
“Not that I have already reached the goal or am already fully mature, but I make every effort to take hold of it because I also have been taken hold of by Christ Jesus. 13 Brothers, I do not consider myself to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and reaching forward to what is ahead, 14 I pursue as my goal the prize promised by God’s heavenly call in Christ Jesus.” Php 3:12–14.
So, our focus needs to not be on what was or what is, but what is to come.
16 “Therefore we do not give up. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. 17 For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. 18 So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”2 Co 4:16–18.
I’ve noticed as I near the end of my walk I find landmarks in front of me, to keep going. I’m looking ahead. I’m focused. In the Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis (if you haven’t read this series yet, what are you doing? Get going!)
“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”
“That is because you are older, little one,” answered he.
“Not because you are?”
“I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger.” [1]
Every year you grow, you will find me bigger. I’m finding this to be true. I’m finding that the more I think about Jesus, the less I worry, fear, and catastrophize. I still am struggling with these things, but I keep coming back to the God I know. Enjoying His word like a puzzle and finding the reason the author wrote his letter, book, etc., also changes how I think. In 1 John 2, John spends much of this chapter telling us why. haha.
“My little children, I am writing you these things so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ the Righteous One. 2 He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not only for ours, but also for those of the whole world. “1 Jn 2:1–2.
This is the light we run toward. We do not purse sin and flesh, we pursue godly thoughts, actions, BUT when we do sin, we know who advocates for us. I don’t want to sit in the muddy pit of fear and sightlessness (is that a word? it should be…), we preach to our hearts and to those around us, we have an Advocate. We are not meant to live in the darkness, we trip and fall, land on bed frames (may have happened recently)…Light changes everything. Choices toward Christ.
Peace and love, friend.
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