Devotion for Monday, June 29
 
NEW
 
2 Corinthians 5:17 (GNT)  
"Anyone who is joined to Christ is a new being; the old is gone, the new has come."
 
Most people know that I am the daughter of a Methodist minister. Dad served locally in the Methodist Church from 1934 until his retirement in 1970. The resident bishop was a great believer in the Methodist tradition of itinerant pastors, that meant we moved - a lot!  
 
Our first move came at the end of my 4th grade year. When I got the news that we were to move, I was heart-broken. I cried over all the opportunities I would miss and all the friends I would leave behind. When Dad took us to our new home in the city and I saw the tiny little back yard, barely big enough for the swing set, I was worried about my future. Then I got to explore the cool, three-story house with a front AND back stairway and two rooms in the third floor which were to be ALL MINE! My future began to look brighter.  
 
Just before I turned 16, I got the news that we were moving again. I was right in the middle of high school! Now I was angry! I was just getting into playing my horn and on a roll with school music. It just wasn't fair. Then I found out that my school band and orchestra director was moving to the new school in the northeast and I could have my pick of new school horns. Some of my favorite teachers from my old school were moving and kids I knew from junior high were already there. OK - I could make this work.
 
So, as I've heard many times, when one door closes, another opens. So it is with a new year; so it is with new life in Christ. We are constantly being born into new life and new opportunity as we surrender to the Lord what is in the past. Paul puts it this way in Philippians 3:12-14: "Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.  
Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus."  
 
I learned from my Dad a great deal about moving on. We are about to learn what our new world after COVID-19 will look like. God will have new work for us to do.    
 
Heavenly Lord, show us the way to meet your new opportunities. We praise You for the privilege. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Amen                                                                                                                          
                                                               Sue Uzelmeier
 
820 Almshouse Road  Ivyland, PA 18974
215 357-6998   stjumc@aol.com