Sunday at Central

Well, we had a great sermon at Central today -- Pastor Bob kicked off his summer series called "Honouring God". All of his points were good, but one principle stuck with me -- "Give God the best of you or something or someone else will GET the best of you."

That really spoke to me today. I am sure I am not giving God the best of me -- if so, that is pathetic. It is so very easy to let difficult circumstances or negative people just suck the best right out of you, isn't it? Or at the very least take your focus away, however briefly or for however long! And there is difficulty in discerning when it is best to "not turn the other cheek", isn't it? I don't know -- sometimes, I wonder.

Today, though, I quit wondering for a bit, and just plain out prayed that God would help me give Him my best. That is all I want to do and frankly, I'm having trouble figuring out how to do it. He has to step in -- I KNOW he answers prayer, so I will be interested to see how he works with this one.

I feel very guilty right now for a number of things that I am trying to figure out how to deal with, including letting some situations and people suck the life out of me. It HAS to happen. I can't just keep existing and not progressing. Good grief!

I remember as a kid in Vermont, doing a little fishing for rainbow trout with my dad. And I remember for some reason being prone to catching mudsuckers -- the bane of my young fishing life. That's what we called them anyways -- you know, the fish that are just bottom dwellers. I remember feeling disgusted every time I caught one of them -- it felt more like they were catching me all the time! I had a plethora of mudsuckers in my life. Wastes of time, gotta throw them back since they were inedible anyways, good for nothing -- Mudsuckers.

But today, as well, I am grateful. As I sang and as I prayed to God today, I considered my salvation as provided by Jesus. I thought of the woman who through heavy crowds managed to touch Jesus's robe and was healed. And I thought of how lucky I am that Jesus allowed me to touch just a little piece of his robe as well. Surely that is more than enough for me to keep the mudsuckers at bay and give him beautiful, fresh rainbow trout instead.