Jon the Baptist.

As I sit hanging out in my room that was given to me for the past seven months, it has began to rain. We had hot 20 and above whether for the past 2 weeks, now the rain. It’s still warm, still light out (9:00pm), still the same activities, just rain instead of sun. It really been the first time I’ve enjoyed the rain here. Having not seen it for so long has brought me to place where I once again love just sit and watch it; once again am able to look at it in a different way. Too much of it and again I’d get bored of it and wish it gone, but as of now it brings me peace. Everyone inside, no birds flying around, just the quiet scene of no activity. The smell that comes, reminding of many past experiences of my life. Remembering the smell of Africa; remembering the smell of my cabin, remembering the smell of trying to play tennis as it began to rain. Its these moments that I remember just how much God has brought me through to be where I am. “They” say that the sense of smell is one of you most active senses in initiating your memories. Its that smell that has brought me peace. That smell that is just before its about to rain, where the clouds turn that purple-grey colour and the wind picks up that reminds me of all those times in my past that prove me existence. The feeling of being alive has really taken its place, my brain suddenly begins to bring back those such specific times that it brings a picture. That picture of just one simple thing of years of experience at a place. Its funny how life works like that… You worry so much about your future and things, but in the end was happens to your future, it becomes your past, it is at this very second that you actually have the ability to do something, to worry for that one second over a good cause and make a decision. Its at that very second between future and past that really makes you who you are. Its that very second that God wants… He doesn’t want your future, he doesn’t want your past, though he will comfort you in them, it is your character that he wants. He wants those ever seconds that make you grown either in his direction or in his opposition. Your future is already taken care of, your past has already happened, but the now is where the rest of your life is. The rest of your life is going to be in that one second where you are living now. You can’t go to your future and make it perfect, you can’t go to your past and change it, but you do have the ability to choose this very second; the ability to think this very second; the ability to make a decision that will effect your future. Right now as you read this you have the ability to either trust God in your life, or the ability to try and take over his role of giving you what he, the creator of everything, knows best for your life. When it comes to trusting God, its not hard, for all it takes is that one second of your life, that one second that continues to happen one right after another, and saying, “yes” to whatever he lays our for you.

I think about all my 20 years on this earth, and what memories do I have to show for it? All I have is a few pictures of places… weather they are important or not… there is just a few pictures. My whole life has been in that one second, and it will continue in that one second for however long God wishes it too. I can’t help but look back at these past seven months and say, “that was seven months?! All I have is a few pictures and a few smells…” Thats all my memory will remember, but what has been done to my character will forever change how I choose to spend that one second that I live in everyday. So really, the rest of my life is changed… For the past seven months where dedicated to understanding and learning about the one who I choose to give that one second to, and how much love he really has for that one second, and the love for my choice to give it too him.

I can’t help but think like this about being on my deathbed… There I’ll be, still living in that one second, looking back at was pictures and smells are there, and saying, “that’s it? I’m going to heaven now?! All I’ve ever had was the one second…I’ll I’ve done is make decisions at the opportune times in those opportune seconds…I’m sure glad those decisions were based on my relationship with the one I’m not going to spend eternity with.” Life is short… All it will be is one second at a time… then how will you look back? Will you look back and wish you had made more bold decisions? Will you look back and think…I only had one of these lives, and thats all I chose to do with it?! Will you look back and have an ultimate regret for not taking captive those very seconds and giving them to the one who loves you more then you could ever understand? Will you look back and will you had tried something big? Big enough that it failed? Will you look back and wish you had trusted God with that one second that just kept coming? Or will you look back and realize you gave all you could…you gave your one second…you gave exactly what God needed in order for you to live the life he had planned for you.

Please don’t let yourself get stuck in your earthly worries, letting those very precious seconds go by without even a though…For if your giving those seconds to worry, they aren’t going to God…they are going to Satan…Let the joy of giving up control overwhelm you… Let the joy of being able to look at your life on your deathbed and saying, “I gave all I had”, overflow in you. Let the joy of God’s love for your every second take control of your second, that you may fully understand the joy that God has to offer; a joy that goes beyond circumstances, and goes straight to heaven. You are going to heaven aren’t you?…Doesn’t that now change the rest of your second? Doesn’t that chance every decision that you make for the rest of those seconds God has given you? If it doesn’t… I’m truly worried for you. Please…take the best risk of you life, and give God that second… That goes for Christian’s and non-Christian’s alike. I have began such a life of giving that second and I can witness that there is nothing…Nothing!…that I wish to have more. I find that many people get so into the politics of belief that they don’t even begin to take hold of what believing really brings. Stay in doubt and you will never experience the life of giving up that second. Stay stubborn in giving everyone of those seconds, and you will never experience the joy in its true raw form. I don’t mean to sound like I’m some wise 20 year old…but I can’t but help to share this in a passionate way, because it overflows. I don’t want to argue whether i know exactly what is right in life or not, because I know I don’t, but I want to share this experience that had changed my every second. I want to show others the love that is so readily passed to me by the God of the universe.

On the way to Germany I sat beside a psychiatrist for people with terminal diseases. Basically she just was someone for them to talk to as they lay on their deathbeds. We got on the topic of why I was going to Germany. She wasn’t a Christian, but she told me something very interesting. She said she saw the difference in Christian’s on their deathbed and she saw non-Christians, the difference…The Christian’s were noticeably joyous, and could endure more, because they knew that they were going to Heaven. I asked her why she wasn’t a Christian, and she said, “I want to be, but there just so much that can’t be proven.” I began to tell her the joy of just letting go of those “proofs” and realizing that when you finally let exact science go, God sees that and begins to speak to your calling soul…I told her how I had make the joyous transition…The shooting star experience…she was happy to hear it. She even said to me that, “Well, why doesn’t God do something like that for me.” I told her that he will. She said, “Okay, well if I see something like a pink elephant! Then I’ll know,” in a somewhat joking sentence. Though no pink elephants went by at that very second, it was funny to watch her, because she continually was looking for one…She so desperately wanted to see her pink elephant so she could begin her life is giving her second to God… Now I’ve never seen that woman again, in fact I don’t remember her name, but I believe that she saw her “pink-elephant”, and I was that pink elephant. God was already bringing her to him, slowly but surely. Perhaps I wasn’t in her journey exactly when God was going to save her, but I’m thankful for being part of her “pink elephant”. She was searching, and God will not leave her unanswered.

The point of the story…God’s life is real…God’s love is real…the Bible is true…the life he offers you is really there…perhaps it’s being lived…perhaps its passing you by…I can’t help you anymore in that, it is your second, it is yours to choose what you wish with. But with all my heart, I wish that you would take hold of that second, it’s not hard…it’s just one second.

I’ll be home in about two weeks! And this typing looking out at the rain will be one of my pictures that I will keep, one of those smells I can always remember. This is what Germany will been in the future…just smells and pictures…But what God has given me will last eternally.

God Bless,

Jon