The worst thing and the best thing.

Elizabeth Elliott, in her book, A path through suffering, writes, "The cross is the place where the worst thing that could happen, happened. It is also the place where the best thing that could happen happened. Ultimate hatred and ultimate love met on those two crosspieces of wood. Suffering and love were brought into harmony.
It was while we were still powerless to help ourselves that Jesus died for us...'we shall be saved through Him from final retribution' (Rom. 6:7).
To be "saved" requires a severance from the former life as clean and sharp as though made by a knife. There must be a wall of separation between the old life and the new, a radical break. That means death--death to the old life, in order for the new to begin. 'We know that the man we once were has been crucified with Christ, for the destruction of the sinful self, so that we may no longer be the slaves of sin, since a dead man is no longer answerable for his sin' (Rom. 6:6-7)
This wall of separation, this barrier, is the cross"...We are saved by Grace. "that is a gift, a free gift, from God. Amazing. Simply amazing that the Lord of the Universe, the One who is 'the ruler over all authorities and the supreme head over all powers' (Col. 2:10), 'the blessed controller of all things, the king over all kings and the master of all masters, the only source of immortality, the One who lives in unapproachable light, the One whom no mortal eye has ever seen, or ever can see' (1Tim. 6:15-16, JBP)--amazing that the same One bends His ear to the prayer of a child or of a sinner of any age, and if asked, comes in a makes His home with us. For His name is Immanuel, God with us.
How shall He be at home with us unless our lives are in harmony with His holy life? Unless He lives His very life in us and we live our lives 'in company with Him'? Salvation means rescue from the pit of destruction, from the miry clay of ourselves.
So my decision to receive Him, although made only once, I must affirm in thousands of ways, through thousands of choices for the rest of my life--my will or His, my life (the old one) or His, (the new one). It is no to myself and yes to Him. This continual affirmation is usually made in small things, inconveniences, unselfish giving up of preferences, yielding gracefully to the wishes of others without playing the martyr, learning to close doors quietly and turn the volume down on the music we'd love to play loudly--sufferings they may be, but only small-sized ones. We may think of them as little 'deaths.'
Many who come to Christ have a long, sinful, destructive past. The 'layer of separation,' the cross, stands now between us and our past. We have to make up our minds to part company with it, not by struggle, but by an honest act of renouncing it in the name of Christ. Sin no longer holds authority, 'exacting obedience to the body's desires. You must no longer put its several parts at sin's disposal, as implements of doing wrong. No: put yourselves at the disposal of God, as dead men raised to life; yield your bodies to him as implements for doing right; for sin shall no longer be your master, because you are no longer under the law, but under the grace of God' Rom. 6:12-14).
When Satan the accuser scorns that act of renunciation later and taunts--'Hypocrite! You didn't mean it! You never really put yourself at His disposal or parted company with us at all!'--run to the foot of the cross, our safe shelter and abiding place.
The further we travel on this pathway to glory the more glorious it becomes, because we are given to understand that every glad surrender of self, which to the young Christian may seem such a morbid an odious thing, is merely a little death, like the tree's 'loss' of the dead leaf, in order that a fresh new one may, in God's time, take its place."
If I could have gleaned these truths as a young person, I wonder how different my path might have been. As it is, I have made my choices, some good, some not so good. One thing for sure, we cannot undo what has been done, but from this point on, I will choose to submit to God's instruction and correction in my life. It is my prayer that my dead leaves, will give place to the new ones God desires to grow in my life. And that He will "teach me to treat all that comes to me with peace of soul and with firm conviction that His will governs all."

I am going to the doctor Tues for follow-up on my MRI. Please agree with me in prayer that I will continue to get a "good report."