A couple of years ago we invested in our family time commitment by buying some really good camping gear. It’s a great time that we cherish, where there are no screens in our faces, no distractions from one another…just us, together, on an adventure. We hope this investment, throughout our kid’s lives, will pay off in great dividends. 🙂 On our first camping trip this year I had the following thoughts and today seems like the day to share them:
When we woke up this morning Donnie made us a fire. I was enjoying just sitting by the fire, but there wasn’t much wood left for us. The fire was slowly going out, but I didn’t want that relaxing time to end. I wouldn’t have it! Determined, I got up and was scrounging around for any sticks I could find. I was gathering up even the tiniest little sticks, twigs…anything that would burn. I was willing to gather up anything just to keep the fire going for as long as I possibly could. When Donnie laughed and asked why I was doing that I said, “I’ll get whatever I can to keep that fire going.” The thought that went through my mind was, “I don’t wish that it should perish.”
Well, where did that thought take me? 2 Peter 3:9: “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise…but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” As I scrounged around looking for anything, just anything, to keep my fire from dying, from losing that fire time, I thought about The Lord.
Sometimes its hard for us to truly grasp how much The Lord doesn’t want His children to perish. Satan loves to tell us we’re worthless. He’s lying. Just as I desperately searched for anything…anything to help keep my fire alive, The Lord has gathered up and given out everything He could to keep us alive. Time after time He has given His children provision and opportunity for repentance. He has been longsuffering from the beginning of creation. He doesn’t want to lose a single one of us. Think about my devotion to that one little campfire. That was Nothing compared to the devotion one has for a child. God was so determined not to lose us that, after offering every provision He could to try to keep us alive, He even sent His very own Son to die for us.
I will never be able to think on this verse in the same way. Knowing the effort I put forth for a fire I knew I would eventually abandon, the magnitude of God’s effort for us is simply unfathomable! How amazing His love for us truly is! He searches for those who will allow Him to use them to reach all this lost children and bring them to knowledge of salvation and eternal life. He is not willing that any should perish! If I can be even a twig for Him to use to keep the fire of eternal life going for all His children, I am willing.
I hope I shared my thoughts clearly enough to make clear the point He revealed to me that morning. Rewarding camping trip indeed. 🙂
He loves you,
jamie
considering the word 