Which Tree is it Going to Be?

With each prompting of the Spirit we have the opportunity to eat afresh from the Tree of Life.  It’s fruit magnifies our peace and joy, increasing our awareness of His emphatic declaration: ‘you are now righteous!’  

For years I heard that still, small voice, but opted to ignore it.  Instead I fed on the Tree of the Knowledge of God and Evil, carefully weighing and measuring the pros and cons, calculating the cost of surrender to the Voice.  And there I sat, for years, performing this bizarre spiritual mathematics alongside the rote motions of performance and duty, refusing to give into what I knew in my heart was the path of life. 

I was afraid.  Afraid of the unknown.  Afraid of losing what was in my hands as I groped in the dark for the new.  Afraid that my so carefully polished reputation would be tarnished, or lost altogether, if I was wrong.  

Sometimes the greatest discernment we need in is the ability to tell when a season is over...and to then resist the illusory urge to sustain it indefinitely on life support.  

What lessons I have learned over the last six months are many.  But perhaps these are the major takeaways:

1. Don’t overstay your welcome.  When the grace for a thing has lifted, don’t keep doing it by rote, in your own strength.  It will bear nothing positive and will magnify your feeling of frustration.  It also results in you taking up space as a place holder for the person who IS equipped for the new season.  

2. All seasons end.  That’s not a good or bad thing; it’s just the truth.  And never devalue the people and experiences of a former season just because it ended.  They were a vital part in your journey and played a role in bringing you to where you find yourself today. 

3. Just because your season has ended does not mean everyone else’s has.  We are not cookie-cutter replicas or pawns on a chessboard.  We are each unique; fearfully and wonderfully made. 

3. What you owe others is always secondary to the voice of God. 

4. Absent passion you can still do many good things.  But ‘good’ and ‘life giving’ are not the same thing.  

I chose life.  And my only regret…for me, my family, my friends, my ministry…is not choosing it earlier.

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