moment of faith

So I had this interesting experience last night. I was driving from teaching a violin lesson to Walmart, just running some errands. I turned the radio on and heard “more than fine/more than bent on getting by/more than fine/more than just okay.” Immediately I had this image in my mind of me, shoulder deep in a pit of muck and junk, an accumulation of my fears and worries piling up all around me. Then I saw myself lifting up my arms to Jesus and crying, “Pull me out!” I realized at that moment that it had been awhile since I’d asked God to do that for me, pull me above my circumstances, and that in that time I had been slowly sinking deeper into something like quicksand, or maybe “slowsand.” If anyone were to ask me how I was doing I’d say “I’m fine. Okay. There are hard things and struggles but I’m getting by.” But I really want more than that. I really believe God has called me to more than that. “Getting by” is not the abundant life Jesus promised.
I’m not on a first name basis with Jon Foreman and am not entirely sure what the song “More Than Fine” meant to him when he wrote it, but to me it is a reminder of John 10:10, where Jesus said “I have come that they [that is, you, me, us humans] may have life and have it to the full.” In the Message paraphrase of the passage, Jesus says, “I am the Gate for the sheep. All those others are up to no good—sheep stealers, every one of them. But the sheep didn't listen to them. I am the Gate. Anyone who goes through me will be cared for—will freely go in and out, and find pasture. A thief is only there to steal and kill and destroy. I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of. I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd puts the sheep before himself…”
I believe that I am living a full life, an adventure, one that’s going to extend into eternity. It’s just that I forget. I let the worries pile up and dull the joy God has given me. But in His awesome mercy and grace, God keeps pursuing me, asking “Don’t you want to get above that?” Sometimes, I finally get a clue and ask Him to help me. And every once in a while, He blesses me with a moment of clarity, a moment of seeing His reality in front of me, and all around me. My circumstances are no different in that moment. Everything is the same, but I’m not. I recognize Jesus as the Gate and the Good Shepherd whom I can trust, and I have a little more faith, a little more hope, and I really feel – at least for a moment - God’s joy in me.