Normal Lives

"You search the Scriptures because you believe they give you eternal life.
But the Scriptures point to me! Yet you refuse to come to me
so that I can give you this eternal life."
John 5:39-40 (NLT)

Life is continually changing, nothing remains the same and if we do not learn how to depend on God and rise above the storms in life, we will drown in them. But we like sameness don’t we? Don’t rock the boat, don’t stir up trouble, don’t step out of that comfort zone for fear of upsetting our "normal" lives... And yet Jesus calls us to follow Him. How do we do that and still live a normal life? It’s nearly impossible, if not completely impossible--but Jesus calls us to follow Him on an eternal path, one that begins on earth each day we live.

When Jesus calls us out of our normal life and says, "Come," we are quick to refuse. There’s too much at stake, too much to lose, too much to give up... We accept the gift of eternal life that He died to give us but too quickly refuse to answer His call beyond that. Doing so does not put our ticket into heaven in jeopardy--that is a free gift, given to us when we open up our hearts to receive Him. It’s in the bank, so to speak, and we will cash it in on the day we are called home. That is a very good feeling, indeed!! Our eternity is secure with Him, but beyond that...do we miss all that He is offering?

If we dare to give up "our right" to ourselves, what happens to our normal life? It ain’t so "normal" anymore. It’s a scary thing to do because it may cost us everything that’s normal, or it may cost us nothing at all--but we won’t know until we give up any right to our own desires and ourselves. It is a daily sacrifice, and each day that goes by without coming to Jesus and giving up any right to ourselves, is a day that draws us back into the world of normality--the world many of us would most times prefer. But in doing so, we’ll never know and experience all that’s available to believers--if we won’t come to Jesus and search for the life that He longs to give to all of us we will miss out on so very much! We’ll waste our life piddling around with the small stuff that the enemy likes to distract us with each day.

We fall for the lies so quickly, living in fear, rather than listening to the Truth. We have the Truth printed out to us in God’s Word--right at our fingertips any time, day or night, and yet we listen to the lies of the enemy instead. When we stay in the Word and fortify our lives with prayer and stillness before our Lord, we will be able to give up any right to ourselves, leave the normal life behind and discover and experience things that our normal lives would never have come close to. Perhaps it is not for the faint-hearted, but as believers, if we are living a faint-hearted life, we are not living the life Jesus is calling us to--we are taking our gift of salvation, saying thank you very much for all You have done and end up going home with only a small part of what Jesus died to give us. As we get to know God better and better, the normal life begins to appear frustratingly boring compared to a life lived for Jesus Christ.