While walking on the beach this morning, the sandpipers were quite entertaining. Along the shoreline, they were probing for their food with their narrow bills. The water would rush onto the shore, and the birds would frantically move their little legs away from the rushing water.
When I saw this scene, it reminded me of a couple of things:
- Fleeing from sin
- Avoiding our walk in Christ
Fleeing from sin:
Imagine that little bird is you and the rushing water is a temptatious situation. You have a choice. You can either run just as fast as your little legs could carry you away from it, or you can be like one bird I saw and just stand there and allow the water/sin to wash onto you.
Is there some sin in your life that you need to flee from? Ummmm…I’m pretty sure that we can all agree that temptation is around us each day. I’d like to encourage you to stop, reflect, give it to God, pray for yourself to have the self-control to run away from the sin, and then watch the Spirit produce a great quality in your life. If you find yourself like the bird that just stood there, do the same as the aforementioned. God is a god of grace, forgiveness, and love, and He is ready for you to allow Him to transform your life into something beautiful.
Avoiding our walk with Christ:
Now, you are still the bird, but this time the rushing water is possibly a divine appointment or an opportunity to share. Maybe you are cruising along in your walk with Christ, and you know that you are either not growing in your relationship and/or you’re strong in faith yet slow to doing what God is whispering to you to do. You see godly situations and opportunities coming your way, but you get scared and run. You run to where you feel the most comfortable and less challenging. I’ve been there (working on it now) and done that. I’ll testify that when I let go of my “I’m not worthy” or frightened to take the next step feeling, God blesses. He can and will bless the socks off of you. Here, I’d encourage you to take a breath, release yourself to The One Who knows best, and trust in His plan, not your own. Like the saying goes, “if He calls you to it, He will walk you through it”, or something like that.
A statement my pastor recently said can apply to both scenarios above, “You can choose your choices, but not your consequences.” Think about it. I pray you choose God’s path and not your own. The consequences are much better (even eternally better) when you trust in and follow Jesus. Run to Jesus.
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Keep your “God Goggles” on and learn godly lessons in life from the nature and scenes around you.
What are you running from? Who are you running from? Do you need to run, or let it wash over you? 
Blessings to you and yours,
Stephanie
Flee from youthful passions, and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 2 Timothy 2:22 HCSB
So give yourselves to God. Stand against the devil, and he will run away from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. You are sinners, so clean sin out of your lives. You are trying to follow God and the world at the same time. Make your thinking pure. James 4:7-8 ERV
The wrong things the sinful self does are clear: committing sexual sin, being morally bad, doing all kinds of shameful things, worshiping false gods, taking part in witchcraft, hating people, causing trouble, being jealous, angry or selfish, causing people to argue and divide into separate groups, being filled with envy, getting drunk, having wild parties, and doing other things like this. I warn you now as I warned you before: The people who do these things will not have a part in God’s kingdom. But the fruit that the Spirit produces in a person’s life is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these kinds of things. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified their sinful self. They have given up their old selfish feelings and the evil things they wanted to do. We get our new life from the Spirit, so we should follow the Spirit. We must not feel proud and boast about ourselves. We must not cause trouble for each other or be jealous of each other. Galatians 5:19-26 ERV
