What was your favorite age? Some friends and I were discussing this recently. Mind you, my friends and I have many decades to choose from. Even if you’ve only lived two decades though, you will usually have an age that was your favorite or one that you think will be your favorite. For some reason I always wanted to be 27, and I have to say it was a very good year! My friends agreed, their favorite ages were in their late 20’s or early 30’s. We were adults making real money, but still had youth on our side and did not yet have the responsibility of home ownership and children.
What about you? Do you have a favorite age? Why? By the way, this is a great dinner party question!
What if I altered the question slightly and asked “At what age was your life the most abundant, the most full?”
Although my 20’s were great, my mind immediately went back to my 40’s when I was the busiest and daily life often bordered on chaos. This was during our children’s middle and high school years and the early years of our church plant. There was always somewhere to be, something to get ready for, something that needed cleaning and so on. My husband’s mom also lived with us then, which created even more activity. Our house was full, our calendars were full so life was abundant, right?
At one time I would have absolutely believed that. It made sense to define the fullness of my life by the pace. The more noise there was, the more friends I had, and the more social engagements dictated whether I felt I had an abundant life or not.
By the time our youngest went to college the noise had become minimal and my activities were cut in half or more. I started to panic a little that my husband and I would quickly grow old with limited social activities and interests and become well, boring! I feared our kids would come home to find us quietly watching tv and clueless as to the world around us. We were far from that at the time, but my mind can go down some rabbit holes!
The following summer neither of our kids were coming home which again emphasized the lack of abundance in my life, so I took action to prove I was still hip and had lots of life in me. I started my search with some girlfriends (who are a few years ahead of me in this season of life) and they recommended I run The Peachtree on July 4th. Now, if you don’t know, The Peachtree Road Race is the biggest 10K in the world and takes place right here in Atlanta. It was exactly the kind of thing I was looking for!
Although it was too late to sign up you can often purchase a number from someone who can no longer attend. The week before the race I started my search and found two people who wanted to sell their numbers. I purchased two because I didn’t want to run alone and thought it would be a great memory for my husband and I. You should have seen the surprise look on his face when I proudly presented our numbers and announced we would be running the Peachtree this year! A deer in headlights would be a good description.
We laugh about it now, but needless to say, the idea of getting up super early on July 4th, joinng 60,000 others and running 6 miles for a t-shirt was not his idea of fun. Oh, did I meniton that neither of us had been running very much at the time? My husband may not have panicked about becoming an empty nester as I did, but he panicked a little about running a 10K in less that a week! In the end we had great fun and made that wonderful memory. When we both nearly fell asleep at the Braves game later that day, God began whispering that maybe a flurry of activity was not the definition of abundant life.
What about you? Have you been guilty of defining abundant life as “more” no matter what the “more” is?
We can be guilty of allowing “more” to define us in all areas of our lives. At home as I have already described, at work, and even at church. Working late during the week and working on the weekends is applauded in America. the more phone calls we receive outside of work or the more projects or teams we are on can often give us a sense of an abundant work life. At church, the more activities we attend or are in charge of, the more teams or committees we are on or the more positions we hold can give us the idea we have an abundant spiritual life.
When we use the world’s definition of abundance the opposite also has to be true. If we have less people and things then we have less abundant lives. Put another way when our kids leave home, we retire or even lose a job, when our earnings are no longer increasing or when our health declines so does our abundant life. It’s easy to get stuck here.
Although I chose to share one of my funny stories about trying to keep “more” in our lives, the reality is, during seasons of “less”, I have struggled to find my purpose, my joy and sometimes even my hope. Have you? As a Christian it can be hard to admit this. Fortunately for us there is good news! We do have the ability to have abundant lives no matter our age, how much or little we have, and no matter the season we are in . Why? Because God!
In the NIV, the second part of John 10:10 says “I (Jesus) have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” The NKJV says “he has come that they may have it (life) more abundantly.” (Parentheses added are mine)
Jesus is not just a part of our abundant life or the One we give credit for our abundant life, He is the very foundation of it!
Jesus is abundant life!
As a Christian we believe that God’s Word is truth. If His word tells us He (Jesus) is abundant life then anything else we have tried to substitute for Him is false abundance. Not something that will sustain us. We put our hope and expectations on others or on things instead of God.
Romans 1:25 says it like this. “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator.”
What areas do you find yourself relying on something or someone other than God for abundant life?
So what do we do when we realize that we have allowed something or someone to sneak up in priority over God? We ask God to help re-new our thinking. Romans 12:2 says “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind…”
One of the best ways I found to allow God to re-new my thinking is to identify and write down the wrong thinking or the lie that I am believing on a sheet of paper or one side of an index card. I like the cards because they’re easier to carry with me. Of course you can use your phone or bathroom mirror or any place yo will see it. On the other side of your paper write truth.
In my case here I wrote “Abundant Life = More” on one side of my index card and on the other side I wrote “Abundant Life = Jesus alone”.
When those feelings of not having enough would creep in, I would look at the truth and ask Jesus to be enough for me. I would (and still do) ask Him to meet my needs and fill me with His joy which gives abundant life. Gratitude journals help with this also!
For Jesus to be our all in all, our abundance we need to know Him. Carve time out in your day to spend time with Him through your Bible and prayer. See Him and He will reveal Himself to you. The more time you spend in awe of Him the more trusting you become to let Him be all you need.
When we allow Him to change our minds, we can begin to see blessings instead of problems.
God gave me a glimpse of this last night. My husband and I were quietly watching tv and I realized the house felt full, my heart felt full with just the two of us here.
I pray that you too will experience God’s truth of abundant life today!