Wow it is already September, where does time go? I do love this season most, the air is brisk, refreshing and easier to take in than the hot, heavy air that summer offers. Things seem to start to slow down, and we ready ourselves for the natural landscape to noticeably get quieter itself before the great reveal of autumn’s breath-taking show of colored trees! Living in New York, fall is a time for apple picking, pumpkin patches, cider donuts and great demonstrations of God’s broad-brush strokes of intensely colored patches of red, orange, and yellow trees with spots of warming browns! Adding to that is the fact that we have the Adirondacks that host a large mass of forests to be a canvas to experience all of this color! Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy all the seasons to some degree but fall definitely is top of the list! I think of this time as a warm, comforting hug!
As the weather cools down, I pull out warm sweaters and enjoy hot cups of tea under a soft, XL cozy blanket and, please forgive me lovers of all things pumpkin, but this is cinnamon season! Apple pies, cinnamon buns warm from the oven, apples cored, baked in the oven with butter cinnamon, allspice, and mulled cider mmm… makes my heart smile as I type the words! I also find this season to be a great time to slow down and reflect. Autumn or fall to some, is a season of change more so than any other season for me. With the weather cooling, the leaves changing color and even our choice of clothes are signs of the coming change! From minimal light clothing chosen to keep us cool, to clothes that cover everything, are heavier and are chosen for the degree of warmth they provide on chilly autumn mornings. To be honest I feel the slow down a little more this year it seems.
I find myself in a place where I am reflecting, evaluating and remembering the course I was on when the different journeys of this season began. Evaluating what seems to be “working” and what may need to change. What God has brought me through and added to me since the last mile marker I have experienced with Him.
[Ok, side note, want to know something quirky about me… I love to look up words in the dictionary. I can’t resist looking up a word to see what it actually means or find out that I really understood or knew what a specific word fully meant! I’m definitely wired a little differently, it would bring me great joy to own a really old dictionary, like from the 1700’s! Seriously, not electronic but paper bound dictionary! That probably provokes the same WHAT as if I said encyclopedia right! Anyway, back on track I looked up the definition of “mile marker” since in my recent ponderings it kept popping up in my thoughts… ]
For Milestone it says: 'show the number of miles from where the interstate route entered the state in which you are traveling.'
My application: A mile marker is placed where we take our first step with Papa to right a wrong belief in our hearts. We then place them throughout the journey to mark the AH HA moments we have with Papa God, getting a little closer to being genuinely human. Unveiling what God had intended for mankind to be, His image bearers, and His loved children! A mile marker is the last point of major revelation in the journey when we realize something about God, how He sees us, and what He was asking of us at that first moment of encounter. Which for this season I would say it is to believe Papa God is Trustworthy. Though the ground under my feet is shifting ever so slightly on a constant basis, and feeling that my next step could bring pain, I’m asked to trust that Papa is going to take care of me! It’s not a surprise, for Him it is not unknown, what is ahead is seen and He has prepared me to succeed. I’m continuing to learn that I can trust him in the unknown! I have always been able to acknowledge that truth and in most of my heart I would say I believed it, but not all.
Also, I’m learning that Papa says I am more than I see myself as. As Christians we are berated with comments and ideology that we can’t think of ourselves more highly than we ought. Who determines what the “Ought” is? Man’s interpretation of our actions or the Creator’s intention for us and our hearts true condition? The scripture is true but rarely if ever balanced with the understanding that God thinks very highly of mankind. He actually came to dwell in us, continue to live His life through US! He allows HIS plans to be executed through people, He allows men and women to co-labor with Him to get His dreams accomplished. He became incarnate, a human being like us, to show us what God was like (it meant mankind didn’t know?)! Just so the power of Sin and Death would no longer distort what we thought God our Father is like and what He actually feels about us. The power of sin and death would no longer have power over US, we could “See” Papa and ourselves truthfully! That’s where our value is found, seeing Father God (the Trinity) as good and having good intentions for His beloved creations. Mankind takes up more thoughts in Papa’s mind than there are grains of sand on all the seashore! (Psalm 139:18) God has always seen us from the potential of His original intent for us, not by the fallen state of man through sin. Although apart from Him we are not able to be kingdom fruitful, it doesn’t mean we are not valuable. Papa did not create worthless ones, who are less than trash but ones that would reflect His likeness on Earth and be adopted into the love that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have always enjoyed together!
I felt this season is here to help me see what “Was”, is changing. The ways I’ve been…, the ways I’ve done…, and the ways I’ve thought in the past are going to be upgraded, deepened, or changed altogether. The ways that are familiar to me, the way Papa and I have related to each other, the way I have looked at the church, the bible, my own wants and dreams. So now I reflect on those mile markers, the last encounters I’ve had with Holy Spirit and notice that I have come a ways on this journey of faith! I have not arrived at 100% freedom, but I am further along than when we started! All that I’m standing in now would have terrified me at mile marker 1 and I would not have been able to enjoy the process! But today I have said NO to fear more than I have succumbed to it! The unknown no longer puts me straight to auto pilot trying to protect myself, figure out what’s wrong with me, or attempting to stop the potential pain that I could incur. (see all the projecting going on!) I trust Father God to lead, Holy Spirit to convict, adjusting any part of me that needs it, and I don’t always have to be in the “Right” to be loved and safe. Jesus has never, nor will He ever, leave me alone to defend myself or figure out what I should do about life or the call on my life. From Papa God’s perspective these things He is showing me have always been TRUE!
For me, for us, it is a slow unveiling of what already is. He is revealing the lies we believe and replacing them with Truth (the Truth, Jesus). He works ever so patiently, at a pace He knows won’t crush us, until our hearts are convinced of what has ALWAYS been true… NOTHING can separate us from Papa’s love. (Romans 8: 38-39) Selah(pause and stay in that TRUTH a while.) This is something I saw presented at a conference I went to a while back, (with my added explanation). I hope it helps you deal with the changes that come from one season to the next in your life:
My Identity: Who I am, never changes!
Is always what God said about the me. The truth of who He made me to be, everything He is because I’m made in His image and His likeness. The facts of how I’m behaving, right or wrong, do not define who I am or get to tell me my worth! That is only done by the one who created me and knows the intention behind why I exist! Our actions are what we do not who we are.
My Calling: Why you’re here on Earth, can change! As the Lord has need. You are not locked in for life to one “Job” for the Lord. It may take more than 1 “Job” to fulfill your creators intention for creating you in the first place. You’re not a failure because the first thing you tried didn’t last forever.
For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven… Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
My Assignments: What I feel the Lord is leading me to do, will change! Over a life, because my calling can change, so will how I accomplish getting it done.
Ex. What he called me to do at 23, be a youth pastor may not be the same at 40 then a Lead Pastor at a church across the country, finishing with at 55 as Bible teacher at a bible college in Africa. Or a full-time wife and mom at 23, then at 43 a teacher of His word full-time. Seasons change!
Friend, I hope this helps you to find hope in change and a framework for conversation between you and your Creator God! Enjoy all the seasons of life with the confidence that God is for you! As it reads in the book The Shack written by Paul Young : Papa is “Very Fond of You!”
Fond: having an affection or liking for
Similar: keen on, partial to, passionate about, wild about, crazy about, in love with YOU!
Walking with my eyes up & my heart open,
Roseann Deeb
Co-founder Glory house
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