Aspiration Vacation

Dear reader, what happens to your aspirations when you go on vacation? I am thinking along the lines of New Year resolutions, and the joke I made with a friend I have had since childhood: My resolution, is to be exactly the same as last year: NO changes! We both laughed, but it simply was not true, I was jesting with her, mocking the fact that each year, at the end of the year, we have an opportunity to look back on what occurred that we wish hadn't, what we said we wanted to accomplish but didn't, and perhaps, more poignantly, to be honest about what we really want for the year ahead, without making nice or pretending piety. This year will be different, I tell you... but will it?

I came to terms the other day with some world altering events that impacted each and every one of us. Global effect sounds like such a significant earthquake like wallop, and yet, global effect is accurate; let us not underestimate the residual ripples that you and I are riding like waves returning to shore. When covert covid operations made themselves overt, with globalists attempting to conquer the world, I promised myself that it would not take over my thoughts and reactions; the co-lateral damage, however, spoke to me daily, and had me alternating between quake and aftershock reactions, grief, anger, disappointment, concern, and any number of other sentiments. It has taken some time for me to look at our mutual history, and my personal history too, in order to sort and put into place, what we are looking at as a society, and as individuals. 

The title of this piece of writing is aspiration vacation. Here are the lines I am thinking along, with questions and a scenario included: 

What happens when you go on vacation? Consider an all inclusive resort, where food and drink a plenty is available for your periodic, or constant consumption. What do you do in this case, when you have stated your goal is to get fit and feel fantastic? Do you abandon your plan, "temporarily", for your time away? What kind of mind and body damage is acceptable, during that short stint, when you are displaced from everyday reality and responsibility? 

Is accountability a, sometimes when I feel like it occurrence, or a constant in your life? Do your aspirations go to hell in a hand basket, when you give your mind, body, and lackadaisical spirit, a vacation from duty?

While the world and its global society does what worldling's do, God instructs his people to behave differently, and yet, each human is subject to being influenced, and sometimes, we are pushed and shoved in one direction and another, until of course, we stop the jostling, silence the noise, and read what God has to say. It is when the Word of God speaks volumes to the soul, that clarity around next steps can resound and reverberate in the spirit. 

Listen now to the godly instructions from the apostle Paul:

And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof (Romans 13:11-14)

There isn't a day that goes by that you and I are not responsible and accountable for our time. We are not our own, and we are always on duty, dear reader, whether we like it, or believe this is true, we are always and forever, answerable for the things we think, our utterances, and our choice of activities. I don't know about you, but I do not want my aspirations to slip away, while I let my mind wander in the desert of desperation of no man's land. Nihilism has many gripped by the throat, with end of days doom looming, and giving the impression that time is so short, we all better take what we can get now. This is precisely the mindset Satan attempts to engender in the lost, that know not the God that made them. Lucifer suggests: 

Sleep and rest

You have all night

Tomorrow is a long way off

Raise a little hell

Get drunk

Stay in bed

Indulge your sexual urges

Engage in strife and envy

Enjoy your flesh 

Give in to your lusts for food, drink, and sex

When we compare what Satan wants, and what the apostle Paul instructs, we have highlighted, and low lighted, light and darkness!

Knowing the time

It is high time

To awake out of sleep

Salvation is nearer than when we first believed

Night is spent

Day is at hand

Cast off the works of darkness

Put on the armour of light

Walk honestly in the daylight

Do not riot or get drunk

Do not spend your time in bed, indulging your lusts

Do not give way to strife and envy

Put on Jesus Christ

Make no provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof

You and I, do not know the day of our departure, but God sure does. Perhaps you have sensed that time is sped up, that the sand in your hourglass is rushing from top to bottom at an accelerated rate? If this is true, good! My hope is that you feel the urgency that the apostle Paul is accentuating, in scripture, found in the book of Romans. He speaks of duty, of being wide awake with awareness of the times we are in, and what we must do with ourselves while we are here. 

Armour of light... when I first read this short phrase, I was mesmerized. When I read it again the other day, I was delighted for the reminder of dichotomy. Light and darkness are the extremes. Jesus is the light of the world, and Lucifer wants to snuff out the flickering flame of life placed by God, in each soul, sending them into forever darkness. Satan will take you as is, and attempt to twist you out of the image of God, and work on making you unrecognizable and repugnant to your Creator. God cannot look upon sin and abide it, and Lucifer knows this, because he lives with the understanding, that most certainly, the sand in his hourglass drops grain by grain so rapidly, that he desperately tries to devastate whenever, however, with whoever, as often, as he can. 

Each generation must face the calamitous fact, that evil not only exists, but is an active, powerful player, that does indeed, push and shove humans as best he can, away from wisdom, away from Godly instructions, away from the Saviour of souls, and toward the inky blackness of the abyss. 

Stay the course God has placed you on. Do not deviate, looking to the left, gazing to the right, to see what others are doing. You track the plan you set for yourself under God's guidance, and you will achieve what you aspire to accomplish. 

Praise be to God for new beginnings too, dear one:

Lamentations 3:22-23

It is the LORD's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness