Choose LIFE That You Might Live!

I have mixed emotions about the new year. On one hand, it is refreshing...a second chance, a fresh start, a clean slate. On the other, it is a time of reflecting...people you've lost, time that's slipped away, and missed opportunities.
On one hand....it's been a very good year..a new granddaughter, happy memories, good health, the discovery that I love church again. (I went through a time of not attending church...it's a good story I'll have to share with you all someday.) But this year had it's share of grief also. Deaths of loved ones, news of cancer and diseases upon friends and people I love, the decline of health of our parents, and yes, even the irritating little aches and pains in my own body.
Actually, 2009 has been no different than any of the other years. Each year offers you a clean slate on January 1, as the chapter in your life's story starts over again only to end on December 31. But isn't that what life is? Chapters in your life's story? Gains, losses, happy moments, sad moments, financial ups and downs, highs and lows. The chapters are YOUR story...but The Story...well it's HIS. You are a part of a bigger story. And sometimes, when we question why things happen in our chapters (because it doesn't seem to be what's in MY best interest) the answer isn't about YOUR story. We will never see the big Story if our eyes continue to remain fixed on OUR chapters of that Story.
Where am I going with this? I guess what I would like you to get out of this is that LIFE happens while we are sleep-walking through living. It's time to rise and shine and wake up to ABUNDANT LIFE! Quit focusing on your chapters and begin to read and live the BIG STORY. We can either choose to sleepwalk through life as a zombie..through all the ups and downs, moaning and complaining that it isn't fair, plugging through it, just a shadow of who we were meant to be....OR...we can WAKE-UP....enjoy LIFE with our eyes wide open. Actually choose to LIVE life with all it's surprises...both pleasant and unpleasant, and asking what is the lesson to be learned in all of this and grateful that we were given a chance at LIFE in the first place. So many of us view life through such a narrow window, that we aren't contributing very much to the bigger picture. Your life is not your own, it was bought by a price.(1 Cor. 6:19-20) You do not exist for your own purpose. You exist for ABUNDANT LIFE which can only be found in God's Son, Jesus. (I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.~John 10:10.)
A song I listen to has this phrase in it..."Choose LIFE that you might live."
As this new year (2010) comes bursting forth tonight...view it as an opportunity....It is a choice. LIFE or just living??? I CHOOSE LIFE!