Another birthday

Well, I turned 46 yesterday.  Yep, on the downhill to 50, which makes me feel old (no offense to any 50 year olds- I'm right behind you).  And yet, I have eternity with the Lord, so when I look at it that way, I'm just a baby, right?    Over birthday cake and presents, my husband asked me what my goals were for the next year of my life.  Good question...worth some thought.  Here's my list:

 1). I know that I want to be changed.  I want to be so filled with the Holy Spirit and thus so supernaturally different, that I will only make sense if you explain me with God. 

 2).  I want to learn to pray, to really pray.  To just sit for an hour in the Lord's presence and not feel rushed or distracted.
 
 3). I want to wake up everyday and ask what God would have me do and then do it.

 4). I want to go on a mission trip, but I want it to be one where I can be exposed to true poverty.  I know that sounds strange, but I need to see poverty and experience it, and I need to do something about it.

 5).  I want to be more focused on my family- not doing more, but just being with them, instead of doing for them- to look in their eyes and listen to whatever they want to talk about, and laugh long with them. 
  
 6).  I want to not want- at least nothing but what God wants.

   I know this may all sound so spiritual, but the truth is that I should already be here to some degree.  I have been a Christian for so long and yet I'm so unchanged.  Oh I'm different than I was when I became a Christian.  I was a broken girl from a broken family.  I didn't love myself and didn't think anyone else could either.  I felt such a longing for God but didn't know where to find Him.  But God found me,  and I 've never been the same.  However, I feel that there is still a long way to go.  I sense that this growth is going to take some effort on my part, that I 'll need to leave the comfortable groove of Christian living that I've found myself in.  Things have become too familiar, too taken for granted, like a marriage that's evolved into a roommate relationship.  I need to be filled and directed by the Holy Spirit in such a way that I know I am giving it all I have, that I am laying it all out there to be used of God.  Can I do this at 46, as opposed to the other years of my life?  Not if depends on me.  Good thing it doesn't.