I thought to myself, I could not possibly be the only teenage girl out there who wants to grow deeper and stronger in faith. I could not possibly be the only teenage girl out there who is struggling in living the Christian life. There has got to be...
Finding Your Way Back To God YouVersion / bible.com / http://waterbrookmultnomah.com/catalog.php?work=235828 Day 5
Now this is living!
God has a dream for this world, and you're invited to be a part of it. It is an irresistible dream that God has had for all eternity. It's a dream for your life, your community, and the whole world.
God's dream is that you would live each second of your existence with a confidence that he relentlessly and passionately loves you. His dream is that you would willingly risk loving others because you know God has risked everything in loving you.
That's why the final awakening on the journey of finding your way back to God is the awakening to life. When we truly awaken to the new life God offers at home with him, we see the possibilities for our future completely differently. We exclaim, "Now this is living!" but we realize that "living" means something different now. It means living a life that is better, bigger, and more meaningful than ever before.
Your new, lifelong walk with Jesus is a journey you never need travel alone. You never need to live apart from your heavenly Father again. If you find yourself drifting into complacency, looking for substitutes, thinking you have all the answers you need for yourself . . . you know what to do.
Come back to the life that is really living! You know the way, and home is where you always belong.
Be prepared in the years ahead for a kind of life that's different from anything you thought possible when you made a U-turn on the road that day and asked the Father for help. The awakening to life brings with it unexpected influence and opportunities. How can this be? It's because Christ is alive in you, and that changes just about everything. Now you can bring hope where there has been discouragement. Now you can show prisoners the way to freedom. Now you can be light in the darkness.
And that is living!
Find your place in the community of other grateful sons and daughters of the Father. Connect, learn, and work alongside them to make a difference for good in marriages, homes, schools, workplaces, and communities.
Let's keep helping others find their way back to God. That's where the real celebration is waiting.
As you look back on this five-day devotional, what "awakening" do you resonate with most? What next step do you believe God is calling you to?
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
2 Corinthians 5:17
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Ah! What a wonderful way to end this devotion; what a wonderful reading.
What I can add here is that yes, our relationship with God is between just us and God. But that doesn't mean that no one can help you in it. No one can n=be a Christian alone. We need growth, and we need others to help us grow. Being connected to a group of fellow Christians is a blessing that God wants to give us.
One advice: The moment you open your eyes in the morning, don't get up yet. It doesn't matter how much you have to do for the day. It doesn't matter if you are two hours late. Just don't get up yet. Instead, smile. Declare that this day is will be full of blessings, favors, miracles, kindness, happiness, smiles and laughter. Declare that this day will be better that yesterday. And send a little thank you to God above. This would take what, two minutes of your morning?
May God open the floodgates of heaven towards you! -AmethystRose
