Your Latter Will Be Greater

Today I have the privilege of introducing you to Leaving A Legacy’s featured blogger for the month of August, Deidra from The Middle – Daily Devotion Blog. Deidra has a love for the Lord and a beautiful way of sharing words straight from her soul that will challenge you to mature and grow . Please stop by and visit her blog, you’ll enjoy her style of writing as it draws your heart closer to Jesus.

It’s almost strange to look at this sign now—it seems like the punch line of a joke or part of the lyrics to a bad country song—but it’s a real place way down in south Georgia; it’s where I’m from. I grew up on Lonesome Road, not far from this intersection. And although I never really thought about it much in my younger years, now that I’m older, I more fully appreciate the significance of this marker.

For me, this junction was more than a physical location—it was a way of life. I lived at the crossroads for years, teetering on the edge of a breakdown. Struggling to find balance, straddling boundaries, battling feelings that seemed to swirl out of control, desperately trying to meet self-imposed expectations, my life felt like a dead end.

This road sign described my life perfectly.

But one day after years of fighting, I gave my struggle to God and He taught me something profound—those signs didn’t mean anything. I had settled for a life I wasn’t meant to have; I was battling things He never intended for me. I was living under signs that marked locations, not destinations; I was claiming as permanent what was temporary. My start may have been at the corner of Lonesome and Hardup, but that wasn’t where I was supposed to stay.

Although I started from a junction of pain, loneliness, sadness, and dysfunction, that will not be my end. God has good plans for me. He has my future in mind. He loves me and uses all things for my good and His glory when I live a life committed to Him. It’s my choice—get up, move on, walk in His way or live bound on the side of the road, shackled to signs marking the place of my defeat.

What about you? Have you had a less than stellar beginning?  Remember, it’s not how you start but how you finish that matters. Don’t live under the signs that mark defeat—get up, move on, walk in His way. Stay on His path—He will guide you. God loves you. He has a plan, a future, and a hope mapped out for you.  He will complete the work He started.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”– Jeremiah 29:11 (NIV)

Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Jesus Christ. – Philippians 1:6 (NIV)

Bio: Deidra Manning – I’m a faith blogger, free-lance writer, wife, and mother of three. I write about life from the middle—of the country, of His grace, of my mess. I’m grateful, I’m hopeful, and I’m blessed.
 




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