Rise

Read John 16:31-33  Jesus said..."I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world." (v. 33)

I love to sit by the campfire. There is something very soothing about watching fire consume whatever is thrown into it. I had this fire pit out back of my house in Seattle that I spent many hours hanging with friends and thinking. It was kind of like going to Disneyland for me. I would have my bros over all the time and we would sit back there and talk about life, God, love, or whatever else had consumed our minds that evening. I loved it. You know those moments you wish would never end. Those moments in which life feels as if it was suppose to be. Still, peace, joy, love, laughs. These for me are what bring life into a broken world and yet they are sometimes hard to find.

I remember spending hours upon hours with my family camping as a kid. My grandpa and I would fish all day and then take our catch back to our campground, start a fire and cook our fish. My uncle Don would always yell at me because I loved to stick things in the fire pit. Mostly sticks, an occasional bug, or some trash I found laying around. But I loved to burn stuff. Fire is crazy. It literally burns things to nothing, yet the ashes that are left become a rich soil, making a place for new life.

I was watching a show on television not too long ago about the Sequoia National Park and how fires are a vital part of life in the forest. They were saying that if wild fires don’t happen, then new life and new trees don’t either.

This is very similar to our own lives. Sometimes we have to go through intense heat and flame to burn off all the trash we have collected along the way. I know going through hard times is never the place we want to be, but I believe in reason and that maybe it is the place we need to be. Even if it hurts to have our lives crumble down and burn to nothing, it is here where new life starts. If everything in your life right now seems great, I guarantee that some day you will encounter some kind of fire. One without the other gives us nothing to compare it to. We need fire to live, at least to live alive. Hang in there because out of the ashes we will rise!

 

-Shawn McDonald

Visit:  http://www.ShawnMcDonaldMusic.com

Rise (Acoustic) - Shawn McDonald