Casandra Martin

My husband and I were out for dinner. Nothing fancy, just a quick meal before we started working through a list of errands. We got our food, prayed, and began to enjoy our sandwiches.

A few minutes later, a gentleman came over to talk. “I saw you praying,” he said. We had a nice conversation about church, some activities he was excited about, and then he went on his way.

It was an interesting moment. We didn’t think about the fact that others in the restaurant watched as we prayed. When we bowed our heads, it didn’t occur to us that we were leading other eyes toward heaven.

But they noticed. At least one man did. God used the moment to reinforce on our hearts the power we have to influence others through our quiet actions. People are paying more attention to the way we lift up Jesus than we sometimes realize. Others notice the quiet kindnesses, the silent surrenders, and the little sacrifices that define people of grace.

You are not invisible. People see you, watch you, notice you, and pay attention to you every day. People in the store, at work, in the post office, at home, in church, and at the movies. You may be the tool God uses to plant a seed, nourish faith, start a conversation, or initiate surrender. Don’t underestimate the little habits of holiness that flow through your day. Each one may help another see Jesus.

My Jesus Resolution today is live out Matthew 5:16 – I am going to let my light shine. Today I have an opportunity to live out faith in the ordinary, normal places I walk. I am going to be aware of the truth that others are watching. I want them to see Jesus.

I saw my first butterflies today – two yellow ones flirting with a field of fresh purple wildflowers. I have been watching for them. Butterflies are a particular favorite of mine. They dance in the wind, play with petals, and drink nectar. There is a grace about butterflies that seems to set them apart from the rest of the world. They challenge my imagination to see differently and to dream of a life defined by beauty.

Butterflies are one of the best pictures of the transformation God wants to work in our lives. Butterflies don’t start out as butterflies. We first see them as caterpillars – fuzzy worms. After crawling on the ground eating their weight in leaves, the caterpillar turns itself upside-down and spins a cocoon. Inside that cocoon something wonderful happens. Metamorphosis transforms everything about the caterpillar into something new.

When the caterpillar emerges from the cocoon, it has a new identity. It is now a butterfly. It moves differently, eats differently, has a different purpose, and draws a new kind of attention. In their fluttering wings and exquisite beauty, we have a picture of our souls.

My Jesus Resolution today is to commit myself to transformation. Just like the caterpillar, I have to put my whole self in the hands of God and let Him change me. I need to trust His design, open my heart to His power, and surrender to His purpose for my life. Just like the butterfly, the results will be something beautiful, amazing, and beyond my imagination.

The Great Smoky Mountains are beautiful. The horizon is painted with deepening bands of blue as the mountains frame the distance between sky and ground. The upper elevations still have snow and ice clinging to the crevices of the cliffs. The wind blows across the summit as visitors crowd to the edges of the overlook to take in the deep beauty of the mountains.

Trees cover the peaks. Each level of elevation plays host to different variations of vegetation, supporting ecosystems that nurture plant and animal life. As we crossed the Newfound Gap, it was the hemlock trees that caught my eye. Hemlocks are amazing trees. They are called “the redwoods of the east.” They seem to grow straight out of the rock, anchoring their roots in the craggy stone of the sides of the mountain. They look sturdy and strong, able to withstand the wind, rain, and snows that pelt the mountains.

Instead, the mountain was covered with dead trees. They hadn’t died in a winter storm. A fierce wind hadn’t been able to knock them over. They were dead because of an insect. A little bug, the hemlock woolly adelgid, has moved into the neighborhood and the results have been devastating. The insect injects the tree with toxins as it feeds on its sap. The toxin blocks the path of the nutrients through the tree, causing the needles of the hemlock to die. The trees literally starve to death because of a little bug.

If you were to take a guess, it would not seem like an insect no bigger than the end of your little finger could do any damage to a tree that can grow more than 150 feet tall. Yet today more than eighty percent of the hemlock trees are dead.

The hemlock trees remind us of a sobering truth. Sin works like the hemlock woolly adelgid. It seems small and harmless, yet attaches itself where we are most vulnerable. It can interrupt our connection to Christ, leaving us to slowly starve to death.

My Jesus Resolution today is to be on the lookout for little things that can have a big impact. I want to be aware that every choice has the potential to draw me closer to Jesus or open my heart to a little bit of sin’s toxins. It may not seem like much in the moment, but once the bug takes hold, it has the power to bring down even the mightiest tree.

“To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.”  – Martin Luther King, Jr.

I love Dr. King’s perspective on prayer. Prayer is essential to life as a Christian. It gives us focus, shapes perspective, honors holiness, and fuels surrender. In prayer, we meet God. We draw near to His presence and learn to bow in submission to His sovereignty and humble ourselves before His mighty power. Our eyes, which get so distracted and dazzled by the world, become reoriented in the light of His glory.

Faith finds its footing in prayer. Prayer acknowledges who is King and who is servant. It helps us seek His will in all things, asks Him to move in our circumstances and struggles, and opens our hearts to the blessings He longs to pour into our lives.

Intimacy is born in the arena of prayer. It is here that our souls become most transparent, our motives move into the penetrating light of His wisdom, and our actions must stand beneath the gaze of His faithfulness and purity. Here is where we are most deeply known and where we learn to know Him. He invites us into prayer because it is the place where relationship grows best.

In experiencing the power of prayer, we are transformed. As we pour out our hearts to God in prayer, He moves in and fills us with Himself. Prayer helps us shed the selfish, me-oriented baggage that we tend to carry around. In its place, God changes us to look more like Jesus. With each word, we take on more of His character. With each confession, we receive more grace. With each note of praise, we learn to seek His face. With each act of surrender, we walk deeper into His presence.

My Jesus Resolution today is to pray. I want to pray without ceasing. I want to develop an awareness of His presence that is so vibrant that I can’t help but invest myself in conversation with Him. I want prayer to be as natural as breathing.

Sweaty and sticky, I stepped into the shower and let the hot water roll over me. Do you know the feeling? Just standing there letting the water wash away the grime felt like heaven. After a few minutes and a little soap, I started feeling like a new person.

It is amazing how a quick shower can change your perspective. All I did was wash the dirt off, but I went from feeling yucky to feeling refreshed and renewed. Today I am thankful for my shower.

The water coming out of the shower always reminds me of the waterfall that cleanses our souls. Walking in the world makes us sticky. We pick up bits of self-reliance, lost focus, and turmoil while moving through our days. We step in sin, stumble in selfishness, and struggle with surrender. On our own, we are doomed to stay sticky and grimy.

While the hot water in the shower cleans our bodies, the blood of Jesus washes the grime and guilt away from our hearts. His precious blood cascades over a believer’s heart like a waterfall of grace. It continually rinses away the rebellion that so often tramples on my heart, reshaping me into the image of Christ.

My Jesus Resolution today is to be thankful for being clean. I am thankful for clean water, bubbly soap, and big towels. I am even more thankful for the blood that washes the sin away from my soul. His grace and mercy have the power to cleanse even the deepest stain, the nastiest sin, and the most stubborn rebellion. Because of the cross, I don’t have to walk around feeling sticky. I can have a fresh, clean heart today and that feels like heaven.

It made me smile. I was driving along the highway and saw the sign. Blessing, TX – 20 miles. Make a right turn, spend a few minutes on the road, and you could end up in Blessing.

I like the idea of visiting Blessing, but what really captures my imagination is the idea of living in Blessing. Wouldn’t you like Blessing to be the address of your heart? It would be so neat to answer the question, “Where do you live?” by being able to say, “I live in Blessing.” Every time you wrote your address, you would write Blessing. Every time you gave someone directions, you would steer them toward Blessing. Every time you head for home, you set your sights on getting back to Blessing.

While Blessing might not be the physical address of our homes, it can be the address of our hearts. We live in the middle of God’s blessings. He surrounds us with them, causes them to overflow in our lives, and fills us with the blessing of Himself. His presence is the best location for our hearts. His grace brought my lost soul home. He is preparing a room for me in a mansion that promises to move me straight past Struggle Street and Waywardness Way into His arms. I won’t be surprised to look out the window and see that the name of one of the golden streets in heaven is Blessing Boulevard.

My Jesus Resolution today is to map out my blessings. I am going to keep Blessings on my radar. I am going to watch for the way God is working in my day to remind me that He is near. I am not going to take a walk down Discontent Drive or spend time in Selfishness Square. I want to not only see and count my blessings; I want to make them the place where my heart rests.

I was heading home. Settling into my window seat on the airplane, I felt the drain of the weekend pull on my eyes. I really intended to bury myself in my book, hoping that the miles would speed by as I walked in a world of characters and their stories. I put in my earphones, pulled out my book, and glanced out the window.

What I saw caught my breath. We were traveling west as the sun was beginning to sink into the horizon. The sky was painted with an amazing array of orange, red, pink, and yellow. The lights in the sky, however, merely served as a canvas for the wonder of seeing God touch the clouds. Pulled into dramatic peaks, they soared high into the stratosphere like a child who had pulled the top of cotton candy to see how high it could go.

The sun’s backdrop made the clouds luminous. They glowed from within. Darker in the middle, the edges of the clouds were literally gleaming gold. High above the normal vistas of human sight, God put on a spectacular show. He created beauty for the few of us who happened to glance out of the window of a plane.

The clouds helped me see God. He was here amidst the backdrop of sky, sunlight, and billows of white. His hand touched the threads of condensation, mixing them with light to create a moment of pure splendor. The clouds reminded me that God is in the transformation business. What He touches, He transforms and the results are always amazing.

My Jesus Resolution today is to look at the clouds. I am going to listen to the story they tell me about God. I am going to look for His fingerprints in their shape, see His glory in their color, and be reminded of His immensity in their size. I want to let my imagination soar into the sky as light plays off the clouds that fill the heavens, giving me a glimpse into divine beauty. I want to remember not to be so caught up in getting from here to there that I forget to look up and see God all around me.

Did you ever watch Mr. Rogers? He came into our homes through the television, inviting us to walk with him for a time in his magical neighborhood. It was a gentle world where cardigan sweaters and kindness paved the way for friends to get to know one another.

Neighborhoods are special places. They are the places where we live, where we feel at home. Our neighborhoods are our most personal setting. You don’t have to get dressed up to go outside and get the paper or check the mail. This is where you bring in your groceries, throw a ball, and run in from the rain. Neighbors see your coming and going, the trash you put out by the curb, and how often you water your flowers. The pattern of our lives tell a story to those who live closest to us. Neighborhoods pulse with a rhythm that echoes the beating of our hearts.

Because our neighborhoods are home, we often navigate the streets on autopilot. We see without seeing, moving through the familiar by feel rather than with focus. But it is important to stop and really look at your neighborhood. “You shall not defile the land in which you live, in the midst of which I dwell, for I the Lord dwell in the midst of the people of Israel.” – Numbers 35:34.

God lives in your neighborhood. He dwells on your street. He is present around the corner, down the block, and in your backyard. He resides in the middle of your neighborhood. He abides where you live, and He wants His presence to make a difference in how you live in the place where you most feel at home.

My Jesus Resolution today is look for God in my neighborhood. When I recognize that God lives in the neighborhood, it changes how I see the people around me, the children riding bikes down the street, and the blessings He stacks on my doorstep. When I take out the trash, He is there. When I play, rest, work in the yard, have people over, or sit outside, He is right there with me. He tells me to let honor, purity, and holiness define the address of my heart. He calls me to open my eyes and see how close He really is.

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.” – Leo Tolstoy

We all want to make a difference. It seems to be a universal yearning to leave the world a better place than we found it. We want our lives to leave an impact, to be felt, to be remembered as worthwhile. We long to do big things about the big troubles in our big world.

Here is the problem. Too often we look at the global-sized problems that scream from the headlines and feel small. There is nothing I can do about famine, tsunamis, war, or the stock market. Idealism fades as the reality of laundry, bills, deadlines, and appointments fills our days.

This is where Tolstoy has it right. We dream of changing the world, but the part of the world we can change isn’t across an ocean, across the country, or across the street. The part of the world that we can change is the part that looks back at us from the mirror.

And even then, we can’t change ourselves. The best change we can offer is a change of heart. Surrender opens the door for God to come in and make the kind of dramatic difference our hearts dream of experiencing. And that’s where the power is. God changes me. I share my life-change with you. You surrender and share your life-change with someone else. One by one, person by person, heart by heart, the world changes.

My Jesus Resolution today is to change the world. Not the big world, my world. My heart. Jesus is the answer to making the world a better place, for creating a legacy I can leave for those who will walk in this world after me. I am not going to complain, grumble, or wish away my chance to make a difference. A heart surrendered to Jesus is the best place to start changing the world.

“Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.”  – 2 Corinthians 6:2b

Time flies when you are having fun. Have you ever noticed the fluid nature of time? When we are experiencing joy, time seems to speed up. The moments tick away with surprising rapidity. Pain seems to magnify time. Each tick of the clock carries its own weight that presses on your soul. Fear makes time crawl. Love makes time stand still. Laughter and friendship allow time to jump forward.

Time also seems to work at different speeds depending on your age. I remember it taking forever for my birthday to arrive when I was a kid. I would count down the days and hours. I promise that the three months before my birthday were longer than any other season of the year. Now I glance at the calendar, noting that time is moving ahead faster than I would like to admit.

We waste time, try to hold on to time, fill time, lose track of time, and commit to making the most of time. Time is precious because it is a gift from God. He created us to be linear creatures, to live within the structure of time. He exists outside of time, but gives us time to help us appreciate the value of our days. Because God is timeless, He can fill each moment with the fullness of His grace, the bounty of His blessings, and the abundance of His love. He crams His very best into each moment. His heart yearns for us to learn the value of living each moment in His presence, discovering the glimpses of eternity He packs into each minute of our days.

My Jesus Resolution today is redeem the time. I am going to embrace the time God gives me, being thankful for all of the tastes, touches, feelings, and beauty He allows me to experience today. In each moment, I have the chance to seek His face, experience His grace, be enveloped by His love, and lift up praise. He has given me 1,440 minutes today. I want every one of them to be full of Jesus.