The Dogs Are Locked Up

It has been six months since God changed me. I know there is more to do, much more, but what God has done so far is so much more than I could have ever imagined. I stand in awe of Him and if you knew my heart you would too! 

My heart is so utterly and unreservedly wicked. But God is changing me, I am not the same anymore; LOVE lifted me, when nothing else could help, God’s love lifted me up and changed me for ever. How sweet is that? Too sweet to tell with words, such stories can only be told with tears and laughter. Words are too small. When I was lost in sin He was loving me. When I was angry with Him, He was still loving me. Oh the deep deep love of Jesus! 

Yes there is more to do; I need to surrender more. But I think about what an little old lady said, “I ain’t what I should be, I ain’t what I’m gonna be, but I thank God I ain’t what I was.”  How wonderfully true that is. How was I? Well tonight I was able to remember another way God is changing me.

I was with my dear wife sitting (do I sit too much I wonder?) as she was busy in the kitchen and we spoke about my old habit of verbally blasting people. You see if you had done me wrong and that could be anything... trust me here. If you didn’t say hello when I did. If you missed my birthday or did something that I felt violated my social standards I would be on you like paint on a wall. There were many folks that fell into this category and most were innocent. Didn’t matter. I saw things from my perspective and it was the way it was. I was always right.

The trouble with bitterness and anger is that it’s a like a two edged sword with no hilt: the harder we hold to it swinging it out to destroy others the deeper it cuts it's wielder; turning hands designed by Him to reach out with God's love into claws of hatred and despair. Since Jesus came into my life I have spoken with folks that I expended all sorts of emotional energy on. Most had no clue that I was mad. (I imagine they just thought I was weird.) Yet all the while my tongue wagging, filled with cruel and bitter criticism, poisoning me and all my relationships as well. I wasted so much time watching for offenses and naturally finding them. When a person is full of pride they will find plenty to be offended about. Ask me, I was an expert at it. So I spent many hours rehearsing offenses with smoldering thoughts. I meditated on them day and night; it smothered and polluted everything in me and each day it put me in bed exhausted and made the nights long.

So tonight I asked my wife about the day and told her I wanted to be more of the husband she needed. I mentioned this because I was challenging our family to do things as unto the Lord and it may have come across critical; I wanted to be sure it had not. She told me I had done OK. I had not been angry. How good is that? Not angry, that’s pretty wonderful. Then it hit me how the Lord had been working in me to leave folks alone. I asked her if it seemed like I spent less time raking others over the coals and she responded, “Oh yes!”

Have you ever seen the movie where the innocent man escapes from prison and he’s running head long stumbling through thorny thickets, wadding through black and dirty waters in the dark, branches grabbing at his face and cloths? Suddenly you hear the sound of dogs and your heart sinks for the fellow. They've released the dogs. He will be caught, beaten and punished even more severely than before. None of it, absolutely none of it justly; beaten by the cruel, sin-sick jailer.  Well that jailer was me. 

Life is hard enough without running into someone like me. Someone like me that would take some little thing personal. Then, when all anyone ever wanted to do was to just get away, the sound of the dogs would come. "Release the dogs!" Ever ready, barking, snapping, whining and miserable they would come.  I was that jailer; the thorns, the dirty water and snatching branches were my garden. The dogs were mine too.

God has been so good to me. You see, I had lost control of those blood hounds long ago. Crouching at my door they often turned on me, but God is able too control them! Now He has them penned up and on His watch no one will have to fear those dogs being released again!  You know what? That makes a lot of folks happy, it makes this old jailer a pretty happy man too. By the way, I'm not the jailer anymore, I got a new job! I'm an ambassador for Jesus. It's a joy and, like that little old lady said, I thank God I ain’t what I was.