The Times, they are a changing…©

I found my way back here today.  I was stunned to see the time that had passed. Much has transpired on this long and winding road.  Much of what I have written here in years past I would not write today. The road I started on ended at an impasse. A new path appeared.  It’s why I’ve been away for so long. I’ve not really known how to start afresh here.

I am reminded of the scripture that says that you cannot pour new wine into old wineskins. The Old Covenant was fulfilled once for all, giving way to the New Covenant to begin. It was not meant for them to be mixed together.  One was before Christ the other was after. I’m convinced He was trying to tell us this in Mark 2:.  I never really understood that scripture, but now it all makes sense to me.  “No one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost and the skins as well; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins.” Mark 2:22.

You just can’t mix the old with the new, the new will be lost. My life tells that story. Years of old theology of should’s and ought’s were the wineskin I tried to pour the life of Christ in me, into. All it did was mix everything up, losing the truth.  It is not how I will live any longer.

I have left the ways of religion behind.  I never left God, in all these years, simply and only I left the religious indoctrination, the ways of the should’s and ought to’s . My head has been filled with wrong theology.  I basically was taught, inadvertently, how to become my own god.   My godly life was up to me and how I lived it out.  There is so much wrong that has been implanted in my mind that it’s been hard to know what is right. My self effort defined who I was after all.  The harder I worked, the more I was acceptable to be a child of God.

My performance and striving became like a well-loved security blanket.  Without it I have felt laid bare in the bowels of the dark night.

It’s amazing how dependent you can be upon yourself to do the right thing.  When that is taken away, suddenly you are made aware of just how lost you really are.  What you thought being a Christian was all about is not, in actuality, what it is.

Every time I hear the song it brings a haunting to my soul.  “You call me out upon the waters, the great unknown where feet may fail.”  “And there I find you in the mystery; in oceans deep; my faith will stand.”

What happens in the bowels of the deep blue sea anyways?  Google gave me some answers.

There is no light in the depths, therefore deep-sea creatures have cells in their bodies that produce light.  Most of their bodies are transparent and soft. The light inside guides them on.

I used to ask God to take me into the depths.  I had no idea it would be like this.  I pictured a woman with fervor and passion going after the things of God.  It’s what I was trained should happen.   What happened instead was that the bowels of my theology had to be disemboweled.  He called me out upon the waters, “where feet may fail and fear surrounds me.” My feet failed me.  I had to be carried out by His hand alone.

As a result I am finding the mystery of the newness of the life of Christ living in me.  He is the cell of light that leads me forward.  It is his life in me that attained everything I tried to obtain, setting me free to live in the beauty of two woven together as one.  No longer do I have to try to figure out how to decrease so that Christ might increase.

I watched a video the other day of a caterpillar spinning its cocoon.  Soon after another video was posted of the monarch emerging out of the same cocoon. I have always loved butterflies, especially monarchs.  The process of transformation is fascinating. The old writings of my past are of my caterpillar life.  May you witness the exquisite life of a butterfly emerging from this day forward.

Beautiful things have happened in the dark of my night.

The life I once knew and lived has been removed.  I am more aware than ever of the living organism of His light that leads me on.   It is His life alone. There is nothing else.

©copyrighted Julie L. Todd 2015