Casandra Martin

There was a time, a long time ago, when I wanted to be a tennis star. I dreamed about it as I hit those little yellow balls against the brick wall of the school. I imagined smashes, cheering crowds, aces whizzing over the net, and opponents who were stunned by my killer backhand.

I played tennis, watched tennis, followed the goings and comings of tennis stars, and submitted to practicing and following the directions of a coach. Nobody from Wimbledon or the U.S. Open ever called to invite me to play, but for that time in my life, tennis shaped who I was.

The German writer Goethe once said, “We are shaped and fashioned by what we love.” Love is powerful. It drives our focus, sets our direction, fuels our passion, and gives us purpose. What we choose to love will profoundly shape who we are. Jesus said it this way. “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” – Matthew 6:21

Our world wants to treat love like a magical force against which we are helpless. We talk about falling in love in the same way that we describe tripping over a crack in the sidewalk. It takes you by surprise and leaves you with bumps and bruises. The world is wrong. Love is a choice. It is a decision to set the heart on a specific path. Love requires more discipline, self-control, and integrity than anything else in which we can choose to invest ourselves. It also brings more joy, delight, and fulfillment. That is why love is at the core of who God is.

Becoming like Jesus is the decision to be shaped and transformed by Love. When we surrender to the full force of God’s love, He begins to change us at the deepest level. Our eyes see differently. Our ears hear the soft whisper of His voice. Our mouths seek to deliberately use words to gently point others to Christ. Our hands and feet are given to Him as instruments of love.

My Jesus Resolution today is to practice love. I want His love to define me, mold me, shape me, renew me, and transform me. I want to be careful about where I set my heart. Loving anything but Love itself will leave me empty and unsatisfied. When I listen to the world describe love, I am going to pass its words through the filter of I Corinthians 13:4-7. If the love they describe is anything less, I am going to let it pass me by. In tennis, you practice so you don’t get stuck at love – the lowest score in the game. With Jesus, love is the best thing there is.

The great philosopher, Socrates, once proclaimed, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”

It is an interesting thought. We live in a world that tends to rush, makes lasting decisions based on first impressions, and dedicates itself to valuing the surface over depth. Examinations, by their very definition, take time. There is an investment of the mind, a determination of the heart, and a willingness of the spirit that is required if we are going to pull back the layers and explore the deep meaning of life.

The longer I walk with God, the more I realize that Socrates word’s hold truth. God gives us this life to enjoy, embrace, and examine. He doesn’t want us to float over the surface of life. He longs for us to dive in and experience all the richness, abundance, joy, and purpose He has for us. When we stop and examine our lives, we will find the fingerprints of God covering every moment.

Can you look at your life and see the movement of God? This is the most important examination we can ever make. Until we are aware of God’s presence in the individual, ordinary moments of our days, it will be difficult to live in the midst of His fullness and grace. Study your relationships and feel God’s heartbeat. Examine the rhythm of your days and sense His hand on your life. Look in your pantry and be aware of His provision. Open your Bible and let it serve as a mirror for your heart and a magnifying glass for His great love. Count your blessings and let them frame His movement in your life.

My Jesus Resolution today is stop and examine. With all due respect to Socrates, I want my life to proclaim, “The God-examined life is worth living.” The God-examined life begins by being deliberately aware of God’s presence. The God-transformed life is created by deep surrender. The God-honoring life is fueled by wonder and worship. The God-infused life is dedicated to prayer and truth. Today I am stop and trace God’s fingerprints. I am going to examine His ways, study His movement, and listen for His voice. I want a life worth living. I am going to keep my eyes open, and notice…everything.

Every year we stand in line, sleeves rolled up, waiting for our turn to be stuck. We are there to get our flu vaccine. We fill out the paper work, arriving very early in the morning in order to take advantage of the program my husband’s work offers to employees and their families. Each year, it is a roll of the dice as researchers watch trends and study infection arcs in an attempt to guess which virus might be the one that will cause the most suffering and loss. We are blessed to live in a time and place where theflu doesn’t carry with it the same fear as other diseases.

I recently read in the newspaper that researchers on are the verge of developing a universal flu vaccine. They have discovered a protein that has remained unchanged in the flu virus since the 1918 influenza pandemic that killed tens of millions of people. If successful, the vaccine will virtually eliminate the threat of a flu pandemic, protecting untold numbers of lives, and sending the influenza virus into the background of things that threaten the human population.

I wish there was a sin vaccine. Sin is a far more insidious killer than influenza. Its death rate is unmatched. Everyone who sins dies. Its infection rate is universal. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” – Romans 3:23 It destroys lives, breaks families apart, delivers shame, stockpiles guilt, magnifies misery, weaves its way into our thoughts, choices, attitudes, and perspectives, making us enemies and separating us from God.

“But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” – I Corinthians 15:57. Jesus is the antidote for the poison of sin. When we fill our lives with Jesus, He blunts sins deadly impact and works to transform us into a people who become increasingly resistant to the power and effects of sin on our hearts.

My Jesus Resolution today is to be proactive about my spiritual health. I am willing to take steps to protect the physical health of my family – eat healthy food, exercise, go for check-ups, and get vaccines. I want to make sure that I take the initiative to ward off sin as well. The more we put on Jesus, the deeper we surrender to His will, the more completely we write His word on our hearts, the more time we spend in prayer, the more our eyes are open to His presence, the deeper our worship and stronger our gratitude, the less of an influence sin will have on our lives.

Well, it is almost my birthday. Another year older. Not sure about the wiser part. The passage of time seems to speed up as I get older. I remember it taking forever for my birthday to roll around when I was a kid. Time crawled as I counted down to the day when I would finally be another year older.

The passage of time helps me focus on the timelessness of God. He is eternal. Time does not bind Him. It doesn’t ever crawl or fly with Him. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His loving-kindness is a magnet that is constantly pulling my heart toward His.

There is a beautiful passage in CS Lewis’ book Prince Caspian that captures a truth I want to hang to on my birthday. It is found in the moment when Aslan and Lucy are reunited in the woods. Aslan is the great lion. He is truth, love, wisdom, and grace. Lucy is a girl who loves Aslan and is learning to listen to his voice.

“Welcome, child,” he said.

“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”

“That is because you are older, little one,” answered he.

“Not because you are?”

“I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger.”

Every year that I get older, God gets bigger. Not because God grows, but because I do. My eyes are bigger. My heart is more open. Jesus is taking deeper root in my life. His grace is dearer, His peace sweeter, and His love more compelling. This is the promise that we have in God. Every year we grow, we will find God bigger.

My Jesus Resolution today is to celebrate growing. I want to see more of God. I want Him to be bigger in my life. I long for my heart to be more sensitive to His presence, my spirit to listen more readily to His voice, and my life to more closely resemble His. Every step I take through time moves me closer to the day when I will be with Him in a place without time. I imagine that even there we will spend eternity discovering how big God really is.

I caught my son holding hands in church today. I looked across the auditorium and saw him shrug his shoulders and wink at me. He grinned as I smiled. My teenage son was sitting in the pew holding hands with a 100-year-old beauty.

This lovely lady is one of my son’s favorites. She looks like Jesus and inspires everyone around her to do the same. She goes out of her way to encourage, teach, love, and learn. My son watches her, knowing he is witnessing what it means to walk a lifetime with God.

Today I caught a glimpse of what he has learned from her. He was standing with his friends. He saw her sitting alone. For him, there really wasn’t a question. He quietly moved into the pew and picked up her hand. He and another friend sat by her side showing her that they had learned the lessons about family, surrender, and grace that she has taught them through her example.

Holding hands is such a powerful expression of connection. It communicates comfort, compassion, unity, understanding, love, safety, and protection. Where we choose to place our hands says a great deal about where we choose to put our hearts.

“I am the LORD; I have called you in righteousness; I will take you by the hand and keep you;” – Isaiah 42:6a

My Jesus Resolution today is to hold hands. God wants to hold my hand. He longs to hold me close, tuck me in next to His heart, and teach me everything it means to belong completely to Him. Where I choose to put my hands today will say a great deal about my heart. Will I serve, love, lift up, and give or will I grab, take, and hoard? I want to learn the lesson my son has already learned. Holding hands with the right person can help you look a lot like Jesus.

“Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does
not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it?
And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors,
saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ Just so,
I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
– Luke 15:8-10

I lived this parable today. Well, it wasn’t a coin. It was my son’s wallet. He lost it. We got home from camp, and he realized that he didn’t have his wallet. He remembered putting it in the pocket of his suitcase by his bunk. Unpacking produced piles of laundry, a suspicious smelling towel, a wet swimsuit scrunched under an unused bottle of sunscreen, but no wallet.

He texted his friends, checked with the other campers, and searched through his bags. We waited and worried and prayed. Finally, there was only one thing left to do. Go in search of his wallet. His dad and I got in the car, preparing to drive all the way back out to camp to look for it. We called the camp caretaker, making arrangements to visit the camp and then set out. After a nice, long drive, we pulled into camp and headed straight for the boys’ cabins.

Opening the cabin door, we searched under beds, peered in corners, pulled bunks away from the wall, and examined all the places a wallet might hide. Where could it be? We hadn’t come all this way to give up without searching in every possible nook and cranny. Finally, we lifted up the mattressin the bunk where he had slept, and there it was. Relief, joy, and thanksgiving flooded our faces. And it was only a wallet.

This moment by the bunk bed shed light on the heart of God. We were willing to search diligently to find a lost wallet. God went to much greater lengths to search for me.

My Jesus Resolution today is to remember what it is like to be lost and found. If finding a wallet can produce that much joy, imagine how God’s heart explodes when one of His lost children comes home, when we choose His will over our own way, or when we deliberately decide to look like Jesus rather than imitating the world. I want to bring a smile to God’s face today. Iam going to live found.

I am a perfectionist. I am working to get over it. There was a time when perfectionism crippled my relationship with God. I thought that faith was a checklist that I had to complete. God’s relentless love has shown me that it is a relationship to be lived. There are moments, however, when my struggle with being perfect still makes my heart stumble.

Third day of camp. By this point short nights, early mornings, and baking hundreds of chocolate chip cookies were beginning to take its toll. When we finished serving lunch, I grabbed the opportunity to take a short nap. A few minutes of rest would revive and recharge me. I checked the schedule, set my alarm, and closed my eyes.

The banging on the door caused me to sit straight up in my bunk, hitting my head on the bed above me. “Are you coming to do canteen?” a voice called out. I shook myself awake, totally bewildered by the question. I looked at the schedule again and flew into a panic. I missed it. I misread the schedule and now a mess hall full of girls sat waiting for their popcorn. The perfectionist in me was mortified.

I ran to the kitchen and started popping popcorn. Getting out the bowls, I looked into the eyes of the staff gathered around the table expecting to see recrimination and blame. Instead, I saw love, friendship, and room to be my whole self. In that moment, grace had a face.

The popcorn was a big hit. But I learned more in almost missing the popcorn than I would have if I had gotten right by myself. Someone held me accountable and called me back to the table. Others offered to pitch in and help. Grace overflowed as I realized that the best friendships are not defined by me getting it all right, but by being there and standing together.

My Jesus Resolution today is to pop some popcorn. With each pop, I am going to remember the power of grace. It covers me, holds me close, teaches me to be better, and reminds me that taking a faith step with Him is better than just standing still and trying to do it all by myself.

Yucky doesn’t even begin to describe the bottom of the slop bucket. I just got back from a week at camp. It is always a time in which God’s presence penetrates even the most ordinary moments. I see Him in sun-soaked grins, hear Him in night time whispers, watch Him work in mailboxes, and feel His nearness in the busy tempo of the camp kitchen. But I never thought I would find Him in the bottom of the slop bucket.

For the uninitiated, a slop bucket is a container used to collect the unused liquids after a meal. When the kids are done eating, they pour any leftover milk, lemonade, soda, juice, water, and even syrup into the slop bucket. It saves us from leaky trash bags and makes kitchen cleanup a little easier. But it is yucky.

After emptying the slop bucket at the edge of the pasture, the KP kids bring the empty, dirty, stinky slop bucket to the kitchen to be rinsed out before the next meal. That is where the slop bucket and I meet. I am the cleaner-outer. It is my job to make sure the slop bucket is ready to go for the next meal.

Pushing up my sleeves, I turned the water on as hot as it will go. I took a deep breath, and then regretted doing that. The slop bucket has a nasty smell to match its yucky appearance.

Sticky, slimy, smelly, I started scrubbing. I grimaced at the mess and prayed for open eyes.  The realization of how God was at work in the slop bucket stopped me in my tracks. The slop bucket is a picture of my heart. The yucky slime that sticks to the bottom is the sin that sticks to my heart. Jesus is the Cleaner-Outer. He scrubs, scours, sanitizes, and sterilizes every inch of my heart to make me clean, new, ready, and useful.

My Jesus Resolution today is to remember the lesson of the slop bucket. Jesus makes me clean. His blood washes away the yucky messes I leave behind. He deals with my misplaced motives, selfish attitudes, greedy appetites, and faithless focus with a tenacity and love that should leave me in awe. He scrubs me clean, makes me new, and reminds me that I am meant for better than the world’s leftovers.