Step 3: . We made a decision to turn our life and will over to the care of God.

March 9

Scripture reading for today: Psalm 7 and 8,  Proverbs 3

Have you seen Little Miss Sunshine? It’s a movie that has received a lot of critical acclaim. If you saw it, I wonder how it made you feel…send me an email and tell me, please! I’m taking a survey. I’m serious about this – how did the movie make you feel?

Here’s the thing. My boys thought it was funny – so did my husband. I found it traumatizing to watch. I kept saying things like –

“Why for the love of Pete did they let Grandpa move into their house when he got kicked out of assisted living…for doing drugs???? There are young children in this home – what were these parents thinking?”

“What on earth is wrong with this family? Why are they asking the teenage son to watch over the suicidal uncle? Why does that kid have to beg his uncle to ‘please don’t kill yourself tonight’?”

This kind of questioning during a movie really annoyed my family. It was a good movie. Parts of it were funny. The thing that killed me were all the parts that were so, well, real. Watching that movie with my family left me feeling a little isolated and weird. (I’m pretty sure they thought I was acting like a big goof!)

This week my family and I went on a road trip and visited Fuller Theological Seminary. It was fun! We had an opportunity to have lunch with Dr. Dale Ryan, and we talked briefly about, of all things, Little Miss Sunshine. He shared my reaction to the movie. It felt good to connect to another person at such a visceral level.

If you make a decision to turn your life over to the care and control of God, your life is going to get very interesting. Sometimes you’ll be left feeling like Alice in Wonderland when she fell down that big hole into a strange new world.

But here’s the really cool thing that I can share with you from personal experience. If you invite Him, God will bring new experiences and new people into your life that will allow you to connect with people in new and wonderful ways.

I know that life experiences and our own twisted thought lives often leave us feeling alone, isolated, unique, and not quite right. Life has more to offer than our past experiences or our messy minds. I just want you to know that if you decide to really take step three to heart, you’re freeing God to bless you. Blessings come wrapped in strange gifts. Sometimes they come in the form of a new friend saying to you, “I felt the same way when that happened to me.” That, my friends, is a message of hope. It means we’re not alone, isolated, or a goof.

Thought for today: You and I have expected people, places and things to make us happy – how ’ s that worked out? Some of us have learned that people aren ’ t very reliable, so we ’ ve come to love things and use people. This is twisted. God created us to love people and use things. One of the things I love about God is his intentional transforming power. When people decide to become his desperately devoted followers, God transforms them – from the inside out. This means that God is then able to utilize these people as resources for other hurting people. I know that self-reliance may be a coat you heft on over your shoulders every morning. It is my prayer that today you will be challenged – and comforted – to know that there are people in this world who have been given the gift of loving and loving well. Making the decision to believe, and turning our lives over to God ’ s care and control, is going to give us the opportunity to learn how to love and be loved. This is messy business. So it ’ s true what we ’ ve learned - man, especially man living independently of God, is not trustworthy. But what is also true: man indwelled with the Spirit of God is one who can both know and do the will of Him who sent him. May God place just such a person in your life today! Not everyone can share your past hurts, habits and hang-ups. That means that sometimes they can ’ t relate when a movie (or other event) triggers strong emotional responses in you. That ’ s ok. God will find a way to meet you wherever you are. He may even use a fellow human to accomplish this task.

Thought for tomorrow: It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes. Psalm 118:8-9

March 9
Teresa McBean

Previous devotionals

Other links: www.crosswalk.com &  NACR Online