Well, we are now into the third week of a new year. At the end of last year, I posted a post about closing the chapters of our life that are unfruitful or yielded heartache for us. The new year I began speaking of having 20/20 vision, and last week’s post took us back to thinking about our beginnings in terms of relationships. With all that said and as life steadily moves on, we find ourselves in a new chapter of life. The older I get, I feel more responsibility in writing some of the chapters of my life. Yes, we can never forget that God has an ultimate say, and it is only Him who knows our beginning and end, but He also has given us the ability to make choices in life. If we didn’t have to make choices, He would choose for all of us to be holy and righteous following His precepts and commandments because He wants only good from us, but that is not the design for our life. After, he sacrificed His only begotten Son, that placed responsibility on us to choose whom we will serve. Therefore our actions and deeds will stipulate some of the chapters of our life.

So, taking the time to look inward and see what we can do better or differently in life to make our relationships stronger and more fruitful takes time, but is needed if we want better outcomes in 2020. Everything wasn’t wrong, and so we need to hold onto those things that were profitable to us. Those things that enhanced our relationships and made them enjoyable. Think about how it was when you first dated someone. Did you do those things that usually brought a smile to the other individual? Did you go to great lengths to look your best, act your best and put your best foot forward at all times? That was one of the happy and enjoyable chapters of your life. We know that the daily routine and struggles in life can cause us to change from being happy to be disappointed, sad, and the list goes on in the twinkling of an eye. But, let’s not dwell there. As I think about past relationships in my life, I realize that some things may have taken a different course if I had done some things differently, or put an end to some things that I allowed to continue just to get along. My actions or lack thereof wrote the chapter of my life then. I am asking God to let His wisdom prevail more than ever this year knowing that life will not always be rosy, it can’t be on this earth, but some thorns can be avoided or not even allowed to grow in certain situations.

As I end this post, remember that God has given us free will and allows us to make some choices in the way situations will play out in our life. As always, seek Him first, listen to His voice, allow Him to direct you in the right pathway, and then CHOOSE to follow that path that leads to the next blessed chapter of your life. There will always be new chapters in our life as long as we live, but whether we enjoy some of them is to be determined by the choices we make. The ones we have no choice in that only God will direct, we can only pray for strength and endurance, which He will faithfully give if we ask Him. Nothing is too hard for God, and with Him, by our side, nothing will be too hard for us. I pray that the next relationship chapter of your life, as well as those chapters that hold other situations, will be fruitful and filled with the love, peace, and joy of our Savior. I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live. Deuteronomy 30: 19. I’ll be back next week with a new post, “Not to be Broken!”

Be encouraged, and God bless!

Sister Jackie