
Signing Off…
My friends, the time has come for me to take my leave from the Highland family. I am full of gratitude for all the ways that Highland Presbyterian Church of Baton Rouge has made God so visible to me, my family, and the world around it. As I go, I leave you with my favorite story, which you have heard countless times, but always bears repeating.
When the writer of the gospel of John was an old man, with a school of disciples around him – since he did not fall to martyrdom like most of the young church’s apostles – he would always tell his students to “love one another.” “Love one another.” “Love one another.” One day, one of his students became so fed up with this message, that much like one of my old youth group members, he responded with great sarcasm, “love, love, love, love, love, love, love. Why are you always telling us that?” The old teacher looked at his student and smiled before answering, “because it is what my Lord commanded me. And if you do nothing else, that will be enough.”
So now, I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power…. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, God may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with the fullness of God. Now to the One who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to God be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. (Ephesians 1:17-19; 3:16-21)
All my love and blessings, Janie