Wow! It feels like it has been forever since I’ve had a
moment to sit and write. Working full time, going to school full time, managing
my household and taking care of my mom (along with my siblings) … multi-tasking
has taken on whole new meaning!
After having several strokes the first week of July, my mom
is doing better than she was. However, she still has a significant road to full recovery ahead of her … loss
of feeling in her left arm, learning to balance and learning to dress just to
name a few. However, one thing that amazes me about her is her ‘can do attitude'.
If I am honest, it drives me a little crazy at times. I am so concerned about
her safety and she does not realize some of the limitations that she has.
Namely, she tries to walk without her walker. And the dangers go beyond her
possibly falling and breaking a leg or arm … it becomes a concern of whether she will end
up having another stroke.
Yet here is what I thought about as I drove home from work
on Friday – My mom, not realizing she has physical limitations, tells
herself (and me) ... I CAN DO THIS!
And when she feels herself struggling, she calls on Jesus. I think I have heard her call on the name of Jesus more times in the past two months than I have heard her cry out in the past two years. Even with some of the cognitive ability that has been lost, she has an unyielding belief in the power of Christ to enable her to overcome. In fact, the only time she acknowledges that something is wrong physically is when she does not want to do something.
Most people, however, are the exact opposite. Without having any physical, emotional or mental limitations, they say (we say) – I CAN’T DO THIS!
And for the believer, it is even worse - because we have no excuse. For we are told in
Scripture, ‘I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!’ (Phil. 4:13) and we have His Holy Spirit resident on the inside.
So I ask you tonight …
What is it, the thing that you keep telling yourself you cannot do?
What limitations are you placing on yourself?Is it going back to college?
Is it pursuing a new career?
Is it starting your own business?
Is it sharing your faith with friends and family?
Whatever it is, you must understand that we have a powerful
Holy Spirit who desires to give us strength to accomplish all that God has laid
on our hearts and placed in His master-plan for our lives. Therefore, let us not fix our eyes on our inabilities but zero-in on His overwhelming and all-powerful abilities!
'... if God Himself has taken up residence
in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of Him. Anyone,
of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the
Spirit of Christ, won’t know what we’re talking about. But for you who welcome
Him, in whom He dwells—even though you still experience all the limitations of
sin—you yourself experience life on God’s terms. It stands to reason, doesn’t
it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into
your life, He’ll do the same thing in you that He did in Jesus, bringing you
alive to Himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and He does, as
surely as He did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With His
Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s!'
Romans
8:9-11 MSG
‘Most assuredly, I say to you, he who
believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works
than these he will do, because I go to My Father.’ John 14:12
And, there you have it –
Not on my authority, but on the word and in
the Word of Jesus Christ, the One who gave His life so that we could be reconciled the LORD God Almighty and experience
overcoming victory in every area of our lives.