“’For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the LORD, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future’”. Jeremiah 29:11
Everyone wants to become better; and everyone wants to make progress. However, some may want it more than others. Nonetheless, everyone wants to have a sense of some form of dynamism happening in their lives, and we often go about it in different ways.
For some, if fortune shines on you and you make a certain progress you desire, then your life changes and you are glad about it. For some, they struggle for so long to make even a little progress. All in all, everyone wants some level of progress or movement happening in their lives.
Experiencing change may be a positive or negative process for a person. It could be pleasant, joyful, happy, sad, exciting, miraculous, bitter, unpleasant or draining. Nonetheless, change is part of life.
This article chooses to look at experiencing change in the newness of life; a life that calls you to move in a different way from natural to supernatural, ordinary to extraordinary, self-centered/ego-centered to Christ-centred, worldly-minded to God-minded, wishful hope to firm faith in Christ, prayerless life to a life of personal and regular prayer, and intimacy with God and the Holy Spirit.
This change may not happen of your own accord because “Faith cometh by hearing and hearing through the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). You hear the word, and then you are moved to experience this new life. Or it could be that you get a prophecy about something in your life and that changes your casual relations with God to a vibrant, active and fervent one. It could also be that you got an opportunity to get deliverance, and then God’s spirit gradually takes over your will and your desires.
In each of these promptings, the Word of God is involved and so if you open yourself to the Spirit of God, you witness a change happening in your life. You will begin to see and experience that, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). In this way too, the fruits of the Holy Spirit as seen in Galatians 5:22-23 begins to accompany this change and transformation, hence there is no room for your usual pride and ego.
You are no longer that general Christian who marks “Christianity” as a religion on a form. It is rather about a kingdom that require change, repentance and a new life. You enter into a personal journey of life in Jesus. As Scriptures helps us to understand in John 1:12 that not everyone is a child of God – “But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God.” You become a child of God by having faith in Christ and accepting him. And this faith is nurtured through reading/study of God’s Word.
As you study the Word of God, daily, fervently and learn to spend time with God in prayer, the influence of the Holy Spirit begins to grow within you and directs your desires and will. This walk with the Holy Spirit is a journey of a lifetime. You begin to let your relationship with God be the determinant of what happens to you and the choices you make each day. You never again walk alone and then you can soar in the path designated for you at the service of God and humanity.
DISCLAIMER
The OPINION / COLUMN is authored by independent contributors to the National Accord Newspaper. While contributors adhere to our editorial guidelines, they are not employed by the National Accord Newspaper. The perspectives and opinions expressed herein are solely those of the author and do not represent the views of the National Accord Newspaper or its staff.
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