Life on Pursuit

       I once heard someone say that we are like trees and when we get born-again (the term used to describe someone who is baptized) we are watered with this new water but we still have to work on removing all the bad fruits so that it will not affect the good. After I got baptized, I had the foundation of my faith but I was finding myself backsliding because I still did not have a true relationship with God, which limited God from truly working on me and helping me let go of  my old self. I only knew God religiously, which is what I would call the surface level; I would go to church, pray and sometimes read the bible but it all felt routine and disconnected. I needed something more from God and He needed something more from me, which I later on realized, and what God wanted was my heart. The first commandment is to "love thy God with your whole heart and from your whole soul and your whole mind and your whole strength" (Matthew 12:30); God wanted me to follow Him wholeheart

" You were not kidding when you said this path is narrow; choosing to follow you is not easy but what keeps me going is knowing it will all be so worth it in the end" (me). When I was a little girl I remember being at church all the time because my mom was on the church choir. She would go to choir practice multiple times throughout the week or weekend and would always take me with her. We would go to church twice in one day on Sundays for morning and evening services; we practically lived there, church was our life and it was all I knew.       Although I grew up in the church and had a church family, I felt like a black sheep. I knew about God and I would see people being filled with the holy spirit and baptized but I always felt like I was a spectator looking in from the outside. I went to church because I had to and when I did I never really paid much attention to the preaching but at the end of every service the bishop would say something like, "if your not saved you

                  In this season The tree stands alone  Its branches spread out Some cracked and some old While some of the leaves Wither and die Their time running out Their time to say goodbye The tree stands alone Not wanting to let go Of the seasonal foliage  That's lived out its time The branches must drop The leaves have to leave And all the tree's clinging  Can't prevent what will be The tree stands  With new leaves and new branches  Lively and well They come and they go The tree--- Roots will never go away  As time goes on They will always be constant They will always stay the same ©      ~ Star Latty