John 10:10
Life in the Full
10 I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
John 5:39-40
Refusing Life
39 You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, 40 yet you refuse to come to me to have life.
Jesus tells us that He comes and walked our earth, so that we may have life...But we have free will...We have basically three choices with our LORD...We can accept Him or refuse Him, or just ignore Him...The first two choices seem pretty cut and dried...We know about Him and we decide...We can accept Him or we do not accept Him...Ignoring Him (maybe a form of not totally accepting Him), but seems to be a little bit different...It is like listening, when we only listen a little bit, and only get a little of the conversation...It is a form of refusing Him, but maybe not quite actually refusing Him...If we are not taught about The Father and the Son we would not even know He exists...This form of choice, maybe made, because we are too busy in our lives for Him...We work and don't have time for Him, we are naive, or we just do not know He exists...Maybe the third choice for those who are too busy, are more focused on other things, are willing to give a slice of their life to Him...We might give Him a part of us, a little part...We are prepared to listen a little...
Regardless of the choice we make, He is the One who came for us to give us life, a full life, and abundant life...I think we sometimes, as stated earlier, don't give Jesus all of us...An analogy might be a friendship we have had in our lives, and we only want to give a friend a little about our lives...Or we have another friend, let's say in school, who we only seen, when are other friends, were not around... The Holy Spirit in us wants our full attention...Jesus wants all of us...To get the full life, we need to accept Him fully...
Sometimes, when I reflect on my past prayers, I think I to ignore Him in part...The majority of my prayers are wanting help about something...I sadly say, in my reflections, I have had far fewer prayers of thanks and praise, than the problem prayers...I give Him my problems in prayer, but forget about the good times...I give Him my and my family's bad health problems, but forget about the good times...I have prayed for Him to help me with the stresses in life, but have failed Him in the good times...He answers my prayers, and at times I am sure I have forgotten to thank Him...
Jesus gives us life abundantly...He gives us life in the full...Let us do our very best to give our unconditional surrender to Him...Let us find and then examine the barriers in our lives that keep us from giving ourselves to Him completely, so we do not refuse Him, so we can have life to the full...