A Fresh Start - Encouragement Café - February 15, 2017

A Fresh Start
By Holly Holton
Wednesday, February 15, 2017

      “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!”  2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)

In a few weeks, there will be little green leaf buds growing on the dead, lifeless trees that are planted right outside my windows. With those leaves comes hope for me. Something that was barren and humdrum will, within a few days, become full of life and beauty once again. Reminding me that even though I go through periods of winter, I will never remain there… there is always spring.

When those first buds bloom, and the weather becomes warm, my windows open and I breathe in the fresh air I have been missing for so many months. I start to look around my house, anxiously waiting for the day I get to throw away all the junk that was stored up during those winter months. I gather all my cleaning supplies and diligently clean, making up for the neglect. It feels so good to throw away the old and start fresh and clean and new.

How often, though, do I only focus on my house and never on my heart? Spring is a time for new life and new beauty just waiting to burst out from the darkness, but I can’t see the newness if I am living in the old. I get it; old can be comfortable as a favorite pair of yoga pants. But if we continuously wear yoga pants all the time it is harder and harder to put on something nice and be comfortable in it. So we just stay in those old worn out pants.

Those old worn out pants, to me, are the lies that I have allowed to become as truth. As I enter into this new season, I want to clean out the lies and replace them with the beauty of the Word of God. It is easier to do nothing and allow them to consume me. To fight against those unrighteous lies is hard and requires action. I have become weary and indifferent. I don’t want to get dressed up; I want to stay in my yoga pants. But like underwear, we shouldn’t stay in them for days at a time.

To bravely enter into the new, we must trust Jesus enough to let go of those blemished parts of our mind and hearts.  Jesus meets our hopelessness with mercy and our pain with overwhelming peace. But do we trust Jesus enough to cut loose whatever it is that is holding us back?

We are made new in Christ. We have the choice to let our past consume and define us, always allowing everything else but God to tell us who we are. Or we can step out confidently and with power that comes with our relationship with Jesus. Our faith is not an inactive one. It is powerful and unstoppable.

Ask God what part of your old self are you hanging onto and trust Him enough to let go.

Lord, I pray that Your daughters known that You have created us new. We don’t have to be slaves to old sin, old lies, and past hurts. You take every ash from the fires that have been thrown at us and You make them beautiful. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

© 2017 by Holly Holton. All rights reserved.

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