Shrink Away

     When I pulled a shirt from the closet to exchange my Sunday clothes to something cooler and more comfortable I discovered the top I was planning to wear had shrunk.  No longer was it the loose comfortable shirt I remembered.   I had two choices.  I could either toss it out or get used to the way it currently fit me.   Somehow, I was not willing to continue to wear that shirt which, for whatever reason, had become too small.  I wanted a new one- one that made me feel good wearing it. 

     Is that the way it is when we first become Christians?  We are called out of a life we are used to.  True, it was a life that did not provide fulfillment, but it was the only life we knew.  We had friends we would have to give up, because we simply did not share the same values.  They were the only friends we had, but we were no longer comfortable with their words and actions.  It was time for new relationships.  The decision was difficult; however, as we accepted the call to walk into a new life we soon found that the old ways gradually shrank.  We became willing to make a choice to discard or toss away our old life styles and became comfortable in our new apparel- a new walk that would give us more love, more peace, and a new hope.   

     Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.  Hebrews 10: 19-20;22