A blessed 2020 to everyone! I started last week with suggestions for how to make the year 2020 a good year by incorporating some aspects and activities into your life that you may want to consider. To recap, we have N – Nature, E – Exercise, and W – Worship. We continue with the YEAR as we start 2020!
Y – Yearning. Each of us has certain passions and gifts built into us by our Creator. It is an intense enthusiasm or keen interest for something that makes one come alive. Due to circumstances or people, we may not have been as free to discover what they are or pursue them as we are saddled with responsibilities and obligations we cannot run away from. But it comes out in one way or another. There are actually two yearnings that if joined together would bring out the beauty and success of the other.
One is the truth that we were made to yearn for God in our innermost being. Blaise Pascal, the French mathematician, physicist, and philosopher said, “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each man which cannot be satisfied by any created thing but only by God the Creator, made known through Jesus Christ.” God is calling individuals to experience what He has to offer. He came to offer us Life – the kind that cannot be destroyed by any problem, earthquake, calamity, disappointment, or even death. This is the kind of life that has transformed the worst of criminals, given meaning to the lives of the physically disabled, lifted up the brokenhearted, and sustained the hope of those who are physically dying. That is why Jesus tells people that He is the Bread of Life and those who eat of Him will never hunger again. That is why He offers Himself as the Living Water, and promises that those who drink of Him will never thirst again. When I opened my heart to Jesus Christ in 1971 after years of growing up very religious, I invited Him to be my own Savior and Lord. That began a vital relationship with God and the adventure of walking with Him. I prayed a simple prayer of faith that went this way: “Lord Jesus, I need You. I have been in control of my life all this time and I can’t get it right. I still feel empty, and aimless. I open the door of my life, and I receive You as my Savior and Lord. Thank You for dying on the cross and forgiving me of my sins. Take control of my life. From now on, I surrender myself to You. Make me the kind of person You want me to be.” That decision altered my view of God, of life, of death, of people and began the adventure of discovering His guidance in the affairs of my life!
Unless we find that yearning for connection and relationship with the Almighty God met with a personal encounter with or surrender to Jesus, our yearning to create something based on our God-given gifts will not bear satisfying fruition. It is the key to everything else in our lives – marriage, family, relationships, work, literally everything! Once we have encountered Jesus based on His claims, He helps bring out the creative talents that bear His image as Creator into our lives and imbues it with direction, meaning and purpose.
In my case, I have a passion to learn and explore – from books, from nature, from travels, from others, from experiences. This yearning to learn and explore always came out as I went through life. When I was single and working, I told God I wanted to travel, and I was given responsibility to visit our staff in the provinces and then in some countries in Asia. When I was a mother raising children, I wanted to learn the science of cooking, not just cook something I had to do everyday. I did not have a chance to learn the science then, but am now enrolled in a cooking class online to learn the science of it now that I have the time. When people came to us for counsel, I wanted to learn how to do it properly and studied even if it took me several years to finish. I still want to dabble into painting to see if there is an undiscovered hint of talent I have not explored.
What about you? What is your heart restless for? Evaluate what your heart longs to see, accomplish, or become. What is that yearning you have that you may want to take time to explore for this New Year? (To be continued)
