Joyful Transformation

Don’t you love the first day of a new month? The calendar is crisp and new, I have not scribbled phone #’s and appointments all over it yet. I write my blog in Word and then copy it to blogger, so I have a clean new document for each month as well. The pressure is off for a couple of days on having a “good” month. It takes a few days to add up last month and see how well we did. And this month I am beginning the 40 Days of Fat- Reloaded, or as Fajita calls it; The Samaritan Run. I got a bit of a head start and my total forward this morning is $25.00. This time he is encouraging donating to your favorite charity. My donation this time will go to the Jimmie Hale Mission in Birmingham Alabama. If you would like to join us click here for the details.

A score and a half (and then some) years ago, I truly made a “new start” on this day. Today is my spiritual birthday. Now at almost 10 years old I am not sure how many sins I had to repent of, but I knew that I could not stand to here that song “Oh Why Not Tonight” one more time. I shook in my penny-loafers during the verse that said “Tomorrow’s sun may never rise, to bless my long deluded sight”. I wasn’t real sure what deluded sight was, but I knew I had to be baptized or I would burn in Hell for eternity. I realize that sounds so incredibly cynical and I debated deleting that part, but you know what? It is the truth. I have since learned to love God, to marvel that he would send his son to this earth to die for me. I have felt love and grace and comfort more than words can ever explain. But that little girl, she was just plain scared! Maybe it is something like the first time you hang-glide; there is only fear when you jump off the side of the mountain, but then you learn to fly; before you know it you are soaring! Yeah, I like to think of my Christian walk as soaring. Truth is sometimes I am soaring, and sometimes I am just trying to drag myself back up out of the ditch. Praise God, he is with me when I soar and when I sink. He even cleans me up when I stink! Yes, I wasn’t all together sure what I was doing all those years ago, but I have never regretted giving my life to God. I only wish I had been a better child. I am grateful that he always stands at the road looking for me when I have strayed. I am glad that I now realize that on that August 1st, I became equipped with the great eraser: the only real way to a New Start!