My First Year .. .

I am so humbled .. . by how God works in people's lives and wants to change them into the person he created them to be.

I'm particularly thinking of the other night at Celebrate Recovery when Tess walked up to me and said, "Now this is my first year as a Christian and I'm not sure exactly how to celebrate Halloween." I didn't say anything and she said, "I just don't get the feeling that it would be something Jesus would do. But I don't know what to do with my kids. But we want to do it right."

My first reaction was in response to her statement "This is my first year as a Christian. . . " God must have known that I needed some confirmation that we were doing okay in our mission . . .sometimes we work so hard and we feel like we are spinning our wheels. It made everything worth it just to hear her say that.

But her question kept coming back to me and it was the next part that has impacted me the most . . .She wants to do what is right in God's eyes, not her own eyes.

Now - my background - raised as a Christian, I went trick or treating every year. I turned out okay. It never occurred to my family that we shouldn't be participating in Halloween. It was actually my favorite holiday - after Christmas.
It wasn't until a few years ago, when I started studying worship and what that entails and what that means to God (and what it should mean to me) - that I realized we probably would be better served by avoiding any and all festive activites on this day. We have gone to movies, gone bowling, made homemade pumpkin pies, but not trick or treating. No more haunted houses (I used to love those), no horror movies, no Halloween-Town nick flicks, etc. And guess what - my kids are turning out okay, too. I'm also re-evaluating my self-assessment that I turned out okay.

I LOVE that God himself moves people to stay away from activities that are not God-honoring. I HATE that, as Christians, we try to justify doing things we want to do - or continue doing. Are we submissive - or are we not? Do we want to claim freedom so that we can sin all the more? I seem to remember this same argument being applied by another person name Paul. .. .hmmm, he must have known that it would still be circulating 2000 years later.

I want everything I do to be pleasing to God - and I want it to be right in HIS eyes - not my own eyes. My own eyes are deceitful - and I certainly do not have good vision. In fact, the older I get, the more lenses I need. I have tri-focals now and I still have to wear two sets of glasses at a time to read.

I want to live my life as a Christian in my first year . . .always looking to please Jesus. Like Tess.