By
Ada Brownell
“O
Israel, can I not do to you as this potter
has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand” (Jeremiah 18:6).
If you don’t die young and Jesus doesn’t
come back during your lifetime, you’ll probably spend about 75 percent of your
life as an adult.
The decisions you make in
youth help to form your adult character and mold your personality (and even
your body) in ways that are difficult to change. The real “You” peels off the
mask when you become an adult and who you are is revealed.
People who do great things
often look back in awe, because when they were young they had no idea how God
would use them. On the other hand, I’ve met people who don’t like who they
became. One old man told me he wished he could live his life over—as somebody
else.
Many people assume they became
the person they are because of their parents and other outside influences.
Sure, what happens to us and around us affects our lives, but it is how we react
to our environment that
determines what kind of person we become.
Your environment affects who
you are as much as the genes that held the pattern for your nose and ears.
Often environment determines whether or not you use foul language. If family,
friends, and your entertainment speak filth, those words pop into your mind.
But that doesn’t mean you have to say those words.
If you have been abused, that
could affect the kind of person you are and might help determine what kind of
parent you become. It’s a generational thing, where the sins of parents are
visited into the third and fourth generation.
But children who have been abused are
successful people, successful Christians, and good parents who don’t abuse
their kids. If you know someone in your home has had sex outside of marriage,
that knowledge could affect your behavior when you date. Yet, young people
whose relatives committed sexual sins can go into marriage as virgins and
remain faithful to their spouses for life.
It is not easy. It’s a matter
of the will.
Your “will” is an integral
part of who you are. Many theologians define the “soul” as the “mind, will, and
emotions.” You also have a “spirit” and a “body.”
Understanding the will is
simple. It’s the part of you that says, “I will do something” or “I won’t.”
But we can never be good
enough to go to heaven in ourselves. That’s why Jesus came. The Bible says,
“It’s not by works of righteousness we have done, but according to his mercy he
saved us” (Titus 3:5). Because of His mercy, Jesus bled out so sinners could be
clean and live forever (John 3:16).
Yes, we were formed with some
of the same gene clay that runs through our heredity, but we can become a
masterpiece or a garbage receptacle. If we allow just anything in life to
influence us, we’ll probably end up a trash can. But if we submit our lives to
the master potter, the Heavenly Father, He will mold and shape us into something
beautiful.
Adapted from Ada Brownell’s book, Imagine the Future You,
copyright 2014. Links: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1489558284
Also available in audio ITunes http://ow.ly/TY6uO
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