Having taken a break from studying at bible college this last semester, I’m looking forward to a mid-year, winter intensive.

I didn’t realise it until I took the break, but the continual study had run me dry. To take a break for a bit was a good idea (It was a friend’s idea, so good on her). Because in taking the break, I could come back to my next round of study really looking forward to it.

And I am.

And it feels different. It feels wholehearted.

This is a good thing, because it strikes me that the opposite of wholeheartedness is legalistic adherence. And legalistic adherence is not what God is looking for at all.

God is looking for love. Looking for our heart – and all of it.

God is looking for wholeheartedness. So, if we are His, we should do whatever it takes to offer this heart attitude to Him.

Not that I realised it, but what I evidently needed to do this was a bit of recovery time.

Nothing wrong with that.

Needing a bit of recovery time doesn’t necessarily mean that I was going astray, or that I’d done something bad or I needed to learn something new or be disciplined in my spiritual life.

It just means that I’m a human being.

God is well aware that He is in relationship with human beings, because He made us. And He knows it’s not about rules and regulations. We are in relationship.

We don’t need to worry about dotting every i and crossing every t because Jesus did that for us. As he said:

^“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.

Biblical law won’t disappear, but Jesus has fulfilled it and set us free to walk in relationship with our Heavenly Father, the Heavenly King.

I am a daughter of the King. I am in relationship with God. I am not loaded down by rules and regulations. I am in relationship with Him.

So I can offer myself wholeheartedly to Him – an act of love, not legalistic adherence.

This doesn’t mean that I always know exactly what God is doing, because I don’t. A relationship with God is based on trust and standing on the promises that He has made and believing – even when it doesn’t look like it – that He will remain true and keep every promise He has made.

For the Bible says:

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

So, even when I can’t see Him at work, I trust that He will be. I just haven’t seen it yet.

And even when I haven’t seen it yet, I can still offer myself to Him wholeheartedly.

Because that’s what I want to do, regardless of what my life looks like.

This doesn’t mean I’ll necessarily get a good result in my next subject at bible college, but it’s not about that. It’s about establishing and continuing a relationship of love.

Yours wholeheartedly,

Alison