Dear Anna,
Happy 21st birthday! I was trying to think of
something exciting that would be happening since you turned the magic age of
21, but there wasn’t anything especially impressive…in terms of legal matters,
anyway.
However, you are now one year closer to a few things.
Actually, a lot of things, but I could never list them all.
You are one year
closer to finding complete satisfaction in Christ alone. You may have
family, friends, food, and shelter, but only in Christ can your longings and
desires be fully satisfied. Your satisfaction rests in His atonement and in
knowing that His plans for you are better and more sanctifying than your own.
Your satisfaction has a sure foundation if it is based on Jesus Christ, the Cornerstone—for
He alone satisfied the greatest requirement for sin.
You are one year
closer to finding everlasting joy in Christ alone. As you have sought
and will continue to seek happiness in life, your true joy will remain in the
Giver of Joy. The circumstances around you will fluctuate, but He who is
constant, never refuses joy to those who walk in His Word. Joy comes from
abiding in Him and in His Word—taking in Scripture and clinging to it when all
else is gone. Because when everything is stripped away, you will see where your
heart lies. If it is with Christ, then your joy is complete, for you need no
other because the joy of the Lord is your strength.
You are one year
closer to finding eternal hope in Christ alone. We hope for so much, and sometimes it is
difficult to hold on when all seems hopeless. To give up would be easier, but
our God is not a God of hopelessness, but a God of hope who desires to fill us
with all joy and peace. (Romans 15:13) It is His intention that you hold on,
that you look to the One who was, is, and will be faithful, and who can refresh
your hope when it is fading. Hope is an action (despite what dictionaries might
tell you). It’s active, and you have to keep pursing it; but you’re not pursing
the concept of hope, no, you’re pursing the Person, and His well of hope never
runs dry.
You are one year
closer to finding lasting peace in Christ alone. Christ’s peace is not
something you’ll find here. You won’t find it in a world filled with
distraction, pain, and sin, but you can claim it and own it as yours even
during all the confusion and hurt. If you search for peace here, you will not
find it for it is found only in abiding in the knowledge that our God is the
author of peace. His peace passes understanding, but you will understand a
little more of what it is when you find it.
You are one year
closer to finding enduring victory in Christ alone. In Genesis 3, God
pronounces judgment on the serpent and foretells of his future demise. Victory
was planned even before defeat occurred. God did not intend for you to wade
through the Slough of Despond all your life. He has conquered sin—ALL sin. He
has conquered everything evil, and it is subject to His command until He
returns again when sin will be banished forever. We live in the world, but we
are not of it. Our kingdom is a heavenly one—meaning we share in the privileges
of it even before we get there. Temporary defeat may and likely will happen,
but it is not permanent, for we serve the King who has conquered. A King who
will reign with all power and authority; a King who holds the life of all
creatures in His hand. And He it is who has provided enduring victory for
us—because He chose to, because He loves us.
May you know more fully the complete satisfaction,
everlasting joy, eternal hope, lasting peace, and enduring victory of the
Savior you serve, Anna. Complete, everlasting, eternal, lasting, and enduring:
those words carry a ring of finality about them. And so it is fitting, for the
One who created satisfaction, joy, hope, peace, and victory will have the final
word at the consummation of the age. May you walk as a daughter of the King Who has already conquered, and
may you be blessed as you seek Him and serve others.
Love in Christ,
Kaleigh
