1 Peter 3:15 English Standard Version (ESV) but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,

This is just me. I cannot speak for anyone else.

When I was a troubled teen God showed Himself to be a Sovereign God. I didn’t know what that meant at the time but He chose to reveal Himself to me in the most powerful and personal way. It was His way of introducing Himself to me by saying, “I can change you.”

I was an angry teen who got in fights all the time. I didn’t want to be like that. My thoughts, not my words, were; “I don’t want to be like this.” Suddenly my anger was gone. I knew it and I didn’t know why and I didn’t know how. My Sovereign God chose that moment to introduce Himself.

I was attending a small Baptist church in Maine at the time. They did not practice discipleship, at least not in a way that I now know to be true. They were sheep dippers. “Got that one baptized, let’s go find another one.” They left the initiates to themselves and all of us struggled.

Then Vietnam, the war and to put it politely it was very difficult to see anything good that was coming of it. I suffered PTSD which was yet to be identified as a medical problem and I self-medicated. Years of drug problems and shame followed. I stayed away from family because I did not want to see the disappointment in their eyes that I saw in the mirror.

Then my father died and I wasn’t there. It hit me hard because prior to that my Sovereign God decided I had to quit drugs and took the desire away. Left without medication dad’s death hit be hard and I felt all the pain of my past.

I repented of my life in my heart, not with my mouth, and God spoke to me for the first time.

The rest is history, a new beginning, a newness of life.

John 16:12 English Standard Version (ESV) I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.

Are we ready to hear what Jesus has to say to us now? We might think we are ready but if we do not know ourselves the way He knows us, then perhaps it is best that we rely on His judgment as to when we are ready.

This statement says that Jesus cares about us as individuals and that He has no interest in doing us any harm. This relationship we have with Jesus should be everything we need to have the abundant life He promised. Ref. John 10:10

He will be honest with us but He knows us intimately and how best to tell us what we need to hear when we are ready to receive it. Turn away from Him and you will not see. Ignore Him and you will not hear. Allow the wrong things to concern you and the right things will elude you.

Once we take this relationship with Jesus seriously we will discover how much it means to Him.

Serious relationships need attention. How we attend to this relationship has to be personal. We cannot allow other people to tell us how to love Him. That takes the personal part of personal relationship away. Jesus knows when we are being real. All He ever wants from us is to be real with Him. He can deal with honesty.

Luke 18:13-14 English Standard Version

¹³ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ ¹⁴ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”