Connected

Remain in me, as I remain in you. Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. (John 15:4-5)

There's something about these verses that hit me hard. For the past month, I have been sadly neglecting some practices that have kept me alive during those dark days. My lifeline, you could say, was slowly being detached from my system after I have decided that I was already fit to walk on my own. I didn't mean to, but somehow it happened after school ended and my life had been somewhere between mediocre and good that my focus had been displaced. I just needed a disconnection notice to wake me up from my unconscious indifference to the weakened state of my connection with God. But God does have His ways of bringing His sheep back into the herd

He made me see what I was missing a few hours ago, when an unruly comment about a certain aspect of my life had me off the rail. Then it all started to go back - all of it, everything that kept me from Him in the very beginning. The hatred, the questions, the fears, the regrets and all that I've been keeping from the time I had been somewhat away from Him. I was helpless, hopeless, without a clue of where I'm going from that moment because I was broken once again. After the days in which I thought I was happy, that my life was complete; under it all was a longing for something that I could not understand.

Jesus was the hero. He came to the rescue, took me back in His arms and assured me of what my life was in His hands and how it has always been. He told me that my anxieties are pointless, that He has planned something for me way beyond my current comprehension. That comment meant nothing at all because of Him. Light has been cast in the shadows of my apathetic existence. After those very meaningful minutes, I took some rest; and when I woke up, I saw freedom and happiness before my eyes, back in the love of He who never left my side.

And these verses certainly spoke true. "Without me, you can do nothing." It's one of the most humbling I've ever heard yet I never saw the meaning fully until now. We can only see the good and appreciate what has been given to us if we acknowledge that God is the source of it all; just as we can never accomplish something great unless we truly see that God is behind it. He tells us that we can never live our lives in complete happiness and contentment unless we keep in mind that we are nothing without Him; and the only way we can is to make God and not ourselves the core of our existence.

We can only truly live with meaning when we remain in the love and fullness of God. I'm still struggling in my journey towards it, especially now that I don't have a source of the Word without constant effort. (Morning Talks, I will miss you.) But just as we are branches connected to the vine, it is God who chose to create us and keep us with Him. There is truly nothing that can ever separate us from Him. What lies in our choice is knowing Him, following His will, and maintaining a relationship with Him that is beyond any other importance in our lives. We need not be worried of how our faith would flow to us; we only need to concern ourselves with how to nurture and keep the connection intact in our busy and priority-driven lives.

Hay, God is the best, isn't He? I guess this wouldn't be the last of my thirst. I'm very young and my future is still a road untraveled. I will continue to live with the struggle of faith and hope that one day, with God's guidance, I will completely overcome. But until then, I will be kept safe, happy, and free under the lesson that my life means nothing without my faith and my life is only well-lived if I'm connected to Him. He is the meaning and the true source of everything in our lives. Thank You, Savior. Your love is mighty to save.