Heart Tracks - The Worst Day

      The worst day of my life.  That's what it was to me.  I was about a month into the time after my wife had left me, my ministry was in limbo, I was living on a church campground, and sitting in a Coca-Cola delivery truck in Charlottesville, Virginia, in the dark, at 6 am in the morning.  The darkness around me seemed to be even less than the darkness that gnawed at my spirit within me.  It was my first day on the job, and I had driven the 40 miles to get there along a pitch black, winding road.  I remember thinking as I drove and my headlights flashed upon the trees and bank alongside the road that my life was in such a place that simply allowing my car to run off that road and crash into those trees might not be a bad idea.  Now, as I sat in that truck, all I could think was "Lord, how did I get here?  How could you allow me to be here?  What am I doing here, and will 'here' be the end of all things for me?"  It was a very dark night of the soul.  It was the worst day of my life.

     That wasn't the last worst day for me.  There have been more.  Times when the surrounding darkness of my circumstances pressed in on me, sought to overwhelm me.  Yet in those "worst days" was a constant that could not be overwhelmed.....ever.  That constant was the presence and life of Christ within me.  The pain was real.  Loss was real.  Questions were real.  Christ and His life were more real, even when it "felt" like He was not.  I heard author and speaker Christine Caine recently say that when we live in the fullness of Christ, "the devil on his best day cannot take you out on your worst."  This is true.  This is real.  It can't be explained, but it is certainly proven by the victory we live in that is Christ the King.  That is key.  We are victors, not victims.  The worst days happen, but they do not own, master us, if we are living in the fullness of His life.  He has never promised that we would not have that worst day, but He has promised to live in and through us in the midst of it.  Caine, using the example of Christ coming to the disciples, walking on the water, as they struggled against a raging sea they thought would destroy them, said, "Jesus came walking on top of the water that they were sure was going to drown them."  He will not do less for you and I.  The worst of our lives will always receive the best of His.
      The Father did not leave me sitting in that truck in Charlottesville.  Neither did He leave me in any of the other "worst days" of my life.  I heard of a man who proclaimed each day, not just with his lips, but with and from his heart, that Christ was King of kings and Lord of lords.  When we live in that reality, no worst day may destroy us, and every worst day must bow to Him.  Are you in the midst of your worst day?  Do the effects of your worst day, even if it be years ago still hold you in chains?  Allow Christ, whom Paul called in 2 Corinthians 9:15, " a gift too wonderful for words," to show you just how wonderful He is......even on your worst day.

Blessings,
Pastor O