I spent Sunday evening, eating with and speaking to a group of women who are in a transitional living program in Boise.
Chrysalis provides a safe, loving Christian environment for women coming out of incarceration, addiction, and abuse, and it gives women the tools to change their life-style and become contributing members of the community.
I shared my testimony with them, including many of the different lessons God has taught me through the years. It was a blessing to be with these courageous women and to answer the questions they posed to me, about both my Christian walk and my writing ministry. When I speak to a group like this, God always draws me closer as He reminds me all that He has done in my life.
This morning, I read this verse in The Voice Bible translation:
Don’t use your youth as an excuse; you can and will go wherever I send you. You can and will say whatever I tell you to say. You have no reason to fear the people you speak to, for I am with you and will defend you.
~ Jeremiah 1:7-8
I believe God says that to each and every one of His children. And I believe it would be safe to add to that first line so that it reads, “Don’t use your youth or your lack of youth as an excuse…”
God has a purpose and a plan for everyone who follows Him, and it isn’t limited to those who are young or those who have lived picture-perfect lives. Nothing is wasted in God’s economy, including all of the hard things that come our way in a fallen world. Including the end results of our own sinful choices.
As the years go whizzing by, it is good for those of us who are no longer young to remember that God isn’t finished with us yet. He isn’t finished changing us and refining us and He isn’t finished using us either. As long as we can draw breath, He has a purpose for us to remain on this earth.
Ponder that as you walk through this day. Look for those places where God wants to use you.
~ robin
