Birthdays and fuel tanks

Another year and way too many candles to fit onto a cake so now I am down to one candle!

Birthdays can be poignant now but I woke at 1am and asked the Lord to speak to me and I heard, “Happy Birthday!”

I was reminded that every birthday is a gift from God because my every breath is from him. In the past two years as I have considered our calling to be mindful of eternity, I kept coming back to the extraordinary truth that God is eternally mindful of us. You and I have been in the mind of God since before the Big Bang, before the galaxies began to whirl.

For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.  Ephesians 1:3

God chose to create us - not so that we could endlessly feel not quite good enough, like we can’t please him. God chose us to be holy and blameless in his sight. That’s a gift to beat any birthday present.

The Father chose to adopt us as his very own.  As I wrote in “Living for Eternity”, that means that you were always wanted and always will be.  That makes you God’s cherished child, instead of an accidental combination of cells. You belong. You are held in the eternity of God’s desire for you.  

Hold that thought for a moment.

The One who says “I am the beginning” is your beginning.  Your existence was lovingly planned you before you took a breath. All because God wants to be with you forever.   

So, the years keep rolling in and the wrinkles are spreading but maybe that isn’t so bad, if my birthday is a prompt to remember the love that created me and the love that beckons me on.

May you know that everlasting love today -  a promise of God’s tender care even in this crazy world where tough stuff happens, petrol stations are shut, jobs are unstable and we cannot control our future. 

I have found that when I most need it and I cry out to God, he always shows me that tender care. This week, a friend appeared at my door and took my car keys and drove round London until he filled up my petrol tank. I felt that God was promising me that even when my spiritual tank is dry and all I can see is traffic jams, he will refuel me.  If you are on empty, he will do the same for you. Because as small as we are, the God of the universe is eternally mindful of us.