Tag Archives: New Life

A New Year

Today is the one year anniversary of A New Heart Life! Thanks for sticking with me on this writing journey. It’s been an amazing, challenging year. But here we are, at the end of one year and the beginning of another. Some people make New Year’s resolutions, others pray for a word or two that will define their upcoming year. I want to take a moment to pray blessings over us as we step into the new year. If we take it, a new year can be a new start. It can be a chance to reset, to examine where we are and where we want to be. It can be a time of reflection and growth. I hope that as you look back over last year, you see how far you’ve come on your journey with God and you hold onto His promises for your life in the upcoming year.

“Remember not the former things,

nor consider the things of old.

Behold, I am doing a new thing;

now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?

I will make a way in the wilderness

and rivers in the desert.”

Isaiah 43:18-19

May this be a year of breakthrough. May we live out our salvation as fully surrendered children of the One True God. 

May we be fully alive, embracing the life He has promised for us.

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”

John 10:10

Father, strengthen our faith in you that we may live courageous lives, relying on you for our strength. Pour out your power on us as we walk forward in Your Truth, sharing our lives and our hope with the world around us. 

Deliver us from fear. Let us lean wholly on Your love.

“There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.”

John 4:18a

Teach us to trust You completely, worship You only, and walk with You always. 

Overflow our hearts with Your love. May it splash out onto others. May we be a people defined by our love for You and for the world. Reveal Your image in those we meet, even those who do not walk with you. May we recognize that all people are made in Your image and treat all humanity with dignity and respect; even when we disagree, even when evil distorts your perfect creation. Let us love with a love like Yours, a love willing to sacrifice its own interest to save others.

“Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.”

Philippians 2:3

Give us a hunger for your Truth. May we pursue You through Your Word, in prayer, and in community with others deeper than we ever have before. Strengthen our relationships with our sisters and brothers in Christ. May we stand together in your Truth.

Grant us grace to meet the needs of the people around us. May we be patient, gentle, and kind. Grow Your fruit in us. Give us fresh hope to complete the works You have prepared for us. 

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”

Ephesians 2:10

Thank you Jesus for the salvation you won for us. Thank you that Your blood covers us, cleanses us from all wrongdoing, and delivers our souls from evil. Thank you for sharing Your power and glory. Thank you for allowing us to participate in restoring your good creation and bringing Your Kingdom to earth. Thank you for fresh starts, for do-overs, and for forgiving us every single time we ask. Thank You for showing us the Way to You.

“Peace to the brothers and sisters, and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love.”

Galatians 6:23-24

Thank you all for your love and support over the last year. Let’s jump into 2020 renewed and strengthened in His Love.
Meg

What Does a Transformed Life Look Like?

And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

2 Corinthians 3:18 NIV

After writing the post about the role of the Holy Spirit in transforming our hearts, I was thinking, “Yes, but what does a transformed life actually look like? I wanted it to be defined. I wanted it to fit in a box, with neat little boundaries. I thought I’d be able to write a list, complete with check boxes; these are the qualities of a person with a new heart. But God reminded me He doesn’t color inside the lines and cannot be contained in a box. When I considered a transformed life, He revealed His infinite creativity and the countless ways He can work through a transformed heart

Living with a transformed heart means living

beyond ourselves, beyond our capabilities, beyond our reality.

Sometimes by choice and sometimes by circumstance.

It looks like surrender.

It looks like a soul available – searching for assignment. Whether in seasons of preparation, testing, suffering, rest.

It’s a heart that knows God is all around, in every situation. Finding God and His work in all places.

Open arms. Open hearts.

Willing to be changed. Willing to grow. Willing to move. Willing to sacrifice. Willing to stand.

A life rooted in a secure identity as a redeemed, chosen, loved child of God.

A person who knows God is real; God is love; God is present.

Though the circumstances here, now may not be good, they trust God is coming back to make it good and the bad now is nothing compared to the coming glory.

It’s someone who knows there’s more than this present reality; our present situation, the present difficulty.

It looks completely different than everyone else.

A heart always seeking the face and will of God.

A soul abiding.

A life of supernatural wonder. A life with a new heart sees miracles.

It’s also a life that sees as much brokenness and pain as miraculous intervention.

It’s a heart peaceful in the tension of good and evil, resting in the promise that Christ will return and restore creation to its original beauty.

It’s being present where God is present – among the poor, oppressed, and marginalized.

A transforming heart draws closer to God, even in pain, knowing that we were created in His image and through the blood of His Son, we are slowly molded into our true selves.

It is an awareness of the life of God’s Word and its ability to sink deep into our pores, changing us from the inside out.

It’s a picture you paint together.

A love story between the Creator and created.

A journey, a pursuit, an adventure. Up’s, downs, pauses, and sprints.

Trusting in times of darkness, tension, and the unknown.

Faithful regardless of circumstances and perception.

A belief that God is bigger than everything we can see,

Knows more than we can ever know.

Often it means trusting He knows the way when we feel lost.

Even in the dark, when we strain to see light on the horizon, when we cling to the words He spoke thousands of years ago. Even when it’s work to get out of bed.

Even then we trust.

God’s constant call is, “Trust me.” A transformed heart…does.

So we hope against hope, knowing the Kingdom of God is near, God is good, and He loves His children.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!”


2 Corinthians 5:17 NIV

God, I pray that you would strip me of all that hinders my relationship with you. Peel away the layers of sin, the habits of my past, and draw me closer. Transform me into the woman you created me to be. I trust you…now and always. Amen.