UPDATE: Babydoll has been throwing up and having diarrhea this morning. Poor thing doesn't even cry when she pukes. She is so like her mother though. After it came out she announced she was "all better now" and was ready to get back to playing. Um...no, child. Go to sleep while I go clean the vomit off my newly vacuumed stairs. Thankfully when I called, the woman at Social Services was very understanding. The home study has been rescheduled for March 27th at 11am. It has been awhile since I have had a completely clean house for no reason at all. Off to snuggle my Bundle Boy while he watches Larry Boy for the 50th time. :)
--------------------------------------------------------------
Today is our home study for foster care. The woman coming to our house has been teaching our classes all this time so we are looking forward to having a little one-on-one time with her (My Love may or may not be here).
She is due to come at 1pm EST. Hopefully she can meet the kids, check our their bedrooms, and then I can put them down for a nap (easily and quickly) for the rest of the visit.
The purpose of the visit is for them to check out our home (for safety and to see where the child will be sleeping) and ask us some questions. I'm not expecting it to be too invasive but it is still one more step in the process. We appreciate your prayers today.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Sunday, March 18, 2012
LOVE, part 2
I spent several days this week reading through the gospel of John and studying some commentary notes in my Bible. I took notes to help me see it more clearly. As my attention was drawn to the idea of God's love suddenly it seemed like that is all people were talking about around me. Perhaps the Spirit is stirring many in his Body to learn what love really means. We know what the world thinks love is... Love is a feeling. It is strong and passionate at first and then it fades as time passes and things become familiar. You can apparently love someone but not be IN love with them anymore (whatever that means). But in the end, it boils down to how the other person makes you feel. As soon as you "fall out of love", the world says you are free to move on. According to the world, love comes with conditions.
That can't be right.
God IS love.
Shouldn't He be the One we look to so we may see what real love looks like?
Rather than cut and paste all of scripture here I challenge you to read through a gospel in whichever translation you prefer and watch how Jesus loved others. It is amazing. Take notes. And then ask yourself if you love like that? You will be challenged.
So what did I learn about how Jesus loved?
* he welcomed unplanned guests
* he answered people's questions
* he spoke for justice
* he sacrificed his own human needs
* he talked to people that most would not reach out to
* he asked questions
* he provided a big meal
* he had time to himself
* he discouraged grumbling between others
* he didn't judge by appearances
* he was merciful
* he pleased God
* he told the truth
* he was resourceful to meet a need
* he laid down his life for his sheep
* he cried over a loss
* he raised someone from the dead
* he let someone bless him
* he was a humble servant
* he washed his friends' feet
* he abides in the Father
* he loved
* he laid down his life
Hmmmm. I am pretty sure the way I love according to a life I live for self has some of that and a whole lot of other conditions applied.
I can't meet the needs of my family until my needs are met first. I can't answer your question again because you have asked it 95,000 times already. I can't talk to you in the parking lot because you look like you might mug me. I can't tell the truth because it might hurt your feelings. I can't invest in getting to know you because it will hurt when we move away. I can't let you bless me because I am the servant. I join in on the grumbling because I don't want to come across as self-righteous. I am too good to bend down and "wash the dirt from your feet". I don't have time to ask you questions about how you are doing because I spent so much time telling you about myself. I can't show you mercy because you don't deserve it. I can't have you over for dinner again because you have never invited me to dinner. I can't meet your need because I don't have enough resources.
Yikes.
I have an ugly heart, people. OK, so some of that was exaggerated but it is a wonder anyone can see God in me. My life is all about me and it is time that changed.
When Jesus lived on earth, love was not a feeling. It was not conditional on the people in his life. Jesus loved at all times. He put others before himself.
I want to love. Really love. No strings attached love. I want to reach out to people and not worry about my schedule or finances or capabilities. I want to be God's hands and feet and I want the people in my world to see His love for them. They can't see Jesus if I make how I love all about me. Loving one another has to be about him. That is where the dying comes in. When you die (to self), you are free to really LOVE.
It doesn't matter if they have hurt you or annoyed you or talked bad about you. God commands us to love one another and it is time we really did it.
I really loved this passage in 1 John 3 and I leave you with this for now.
16 By this we know LOVE, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. 17 But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? 18 Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.
Now go love. Love your spouse, your coworker, your father, your enemy, your cashier...as if your life were not your own and your only aim was to show them Jesus.
More to come...
That can't be right.
God IS love.
Shouldn't He be the One we look to so we may see what real love looks like?
Rather than cut and paste all of scripture here I challenge you to read through a gospel in whichever translation you prefer and watch how Jesus loved others. It is amazing. Take notes. And then ask yourself if you love like that? You will be challenged.
So what did I learn about how Jesus loved?
* he welcomed unplanned guests
* he answered people's questions
* he spoke for justice
* he sacrificed his own human needs
* he talked to people that most would not reach out to
* he asked questions
* he provided a big meal
* he had time to himself
* he discouraged grumbling between others
* he didn't judge by appearances
* he was merciful
* he pleased God
* he told the truth
* he was resourceful to meet a need
* he laid down his life for his sheep
* he cried over a loss
* he raised someone from the dead
* he let someone bless him
* he was a humble servant
* he washed his friends' feet
* he abides in the Father
* he loved
* he laid down his life
Hmmmm. I am pretty sure the way I love according to a life I live for self has some of that and a whole lot of other conditions applied.
I can't meet the needs of my family until my needs are met first. I can't answer your question again because you have asked it 95,000 times already. I can't talk to you in the parking lot because you look like you might mug me. I can't tell the truth because it might hurt your feelings. I can't invest in getting to know you because it will hurt when we move away. I can't let you bless me because I am the servant. I join in on the grumbling because I don't want to come across as self-righteous. I am too good to bend down and "wash the dirt from your feet". I don't have time to ask you questions about how you are doing because I spent so much time telling you about myself. I can't show you mercy because you don't deserve it. I can't have you over for dinner again because you have never invited me to dinner. I can't meet your need because I don't have enough resources.
Yikes.
I have an ugly heart, people. OK, so some of that was exaggerated but it is a wonder anyone can see God in me. My life is all about me and it is time that changed.
When Jesus lived on earth, love was not a feeling. It was not conditional on the people in his life. Jesus loved at all times. He put others before himself.
I want to love. Really love. No strings attached love. I want to reach out to people and not worry about my schedule or finances or capabilities. I want to be God's hands and feet and I want the people in my world to see His love for them. They can't see Jesus if I make how I love all about me. Loving one another has to be about him. That is where the dying comes in. When you die (to self), you are free to really LOVE.
It doesn't matter if they have hurt you or annoyed you or talked bad about you. God commands us to love one another and it is time we really did it.
I really loved this passage in 1 John 3 and I leave you with this for now.
1 John 3:16-18 (ESV)
Now go love. Love your spouse, your coworker, your father, your enemy, your cashier...as if your life were not your own and your only aim was to show them Jesus.
More to come...
LOVE, part 1
They say death is a part of life.
What if death was life?
The world sends us messages every day. It tells us what we need and want and must have. It tells us we are worthy and special and entitled. Even Burger King says "[I] can have it [my] way". The world makes my life all about me. I can be anyone I want to be. I can do anything I want to do. Life is what I make of it and then I die. That seems so sad to me. No wonder people fear death. They make their whole life about themselves and then often beyond their complete control life ends without their say-so.
What if we died long before the end of our lives? What if we willingly gave our lives up? What if we lived every minute not for self? Wouldn't that be completely opposite from the way the world chooses to live? Perhaps that is exactly where we need to start.
I can hear it now. "What does all of this have to do with love? She has completely lost it."
When I accepted Christ as my Savior and Lord my body became the temple of the Holy Spirit. He lives in me. Something dawned on me this week. If I live my life for myself, how can anyone see God in me? He is there. I believe it. But all too often I make my life about me. My wants. My needs. My opinions. I don't seek first the kingdom of God. Don't get me wrong. I invite him to be a part of my daily life. But what if God was my whole life? What would my life look life if I surrendered it all to him? People would see God, that is what it would look like. Every day it would be undeniable. My life would look completely opposite than the world defines it. With my death to self comes His life. And if they see God in me, they see LOVE.
I think about a girl who lives in Uganda and has given her whole life to God. Even as Christians we look at that and think "Wow, how could she do that? Give up her "life of luxury" and move to a poor country indefinitely?" Her life is not her own. She died long ago. So when we see Katie Davis, we see God's LOVE and we can't deny it. It looks different from the world.
What if every Christian lived that way? Not move to an African country (to serve the poor and take in orphans) per se but chose to die so that He could fully live in them. When you take yourself out of the spotlight of your own life it is amazing what comes naturally from the Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. When we only give God a portion of our life to try and squeeze His Spirit into, it often gets drowned out by self, by the cares of this world. Our attempt at love, joy, peace, etc. by our own strength seems to reflect the world's definitions of those things rather than God Himself. Even striving to be kind/good/gentle for the right motives (to please God) makes our life about us. It is not until we die to ourselves that we see Him living in us.
I hope someone will speak at my memorial service someday and say, "Today we are thankful for her life because it was not her own. She actually died (long ago) in 2012 and after that all we saw was God's love." Wouldn't funerals be a lot more joyful? OK, maybe they would still be sad, but if we had died to self long before the end our own life God would be seen in our life and death. We wouldn't be remembered as a "good person". When they knew us on earth, they knew God because our life completely reflected who he is. I want to live like that.
You know who else lived like that? Jesus. He came to earth to sacrifice his own life to save us from our sin. He made a way for us to come to God and have a relationship with him. But while he was here, she showed us how to live. He showed us how to really LOVE.
More to come...
What if death was life?
The world sends us messages every day. It tells us what we need and want and must have. It tells us we are worthy and special and entitled. Even Burger King says "[I] can have it [my] way". The world makes my life all about me. I can be anyone I want to be. I can do anything I want to do. Life is what I make of it and then I die. That seems so sad to me. No wonder people fear death. They make their whole life about themselves and then often beyond their complete control life ends without their say-so.
What if we died long before the end of our lives? What if we willingly gave our lives up? What if we lived every minute not for self? Wouldn't that be completely opposite from the way the world chooses to live? Perhaps that is exactly where we need to start.
I can hear it now. "What does all of this have to do with love? She has completely lost it."
When I accepted Christ as my Savior and Lord my body became the temple of the Holy Spirit. He lives in me. Something dawned on me this week. If I live my life for myself, how can anyone see God in me? He is there. I believe it. But all too often I make my life about me. My wants. My needs. My opinions. I don't seek first the kingdom of God. Don't get me wrong. I invite him to be a part of my daily life. But what if God was my whole life? What would my life look life if I surrendered it all to him? People would see God, that is what it would look like. Every day it would be undeniable. My life would look completely opposite than the world defines it. With my death to self comes His life. And if they see God in me, they see LOVE.
I think about a girl who lives in Uganda and has given her whole life to God. Even as Christians we look at that and think "Wow, how could she do that? Give up her "life of luxury" and move to a poor country indefinitely?" Her life is not her own. She died long ago. So when we see Katie Davis, we see God's LOVE and we can't deny it. It looks different from the world.
What if every Christian lived that way? Not move to an African country (to serve the poor and take in orphans) per se but chose to die so that He could fully live in them. When you take yourself out of the spotlight of your own life it is amazing what comes naturally from the Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. When we only give God a portion of our life to try and squeeze His Spirit into, it often gets drowned out by self, by the cares of this world. Our attempt at love, joy, peace, etc. by our own strength seems to reflect the world's definitions of those things rather than God Himself. Even striving to be kind/good/gentle for the right motives (to please God) makes our life about us. It is not until we die to ourselves that we see Him living in us.
I hope someone will speak at my memorial service someday and say, "Today we are thankful for her life because it was not her own. She actually died (long ago) in 2012 and after that all we saw was God's love." Wouldn't funerals be a lot more joyful? OK, maybe they would still be sad, but if we had died to self long before the end our own life God would be seen in our life and death. We wouldn't be remembered as a "good person". When they knew us on earth, they knew God because our life completely reflected who he is. I want to live like that.
You know who else lived like that? Jesus. He came to earth to sacrifice his own life to save us from our sin. He made a way for us to come to God and have a relationship with him. But while he was here, she showed us how to live. He showed us how to really LOVE.
More to come...
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
class four: veteran resource parent
God is always good.
I am sure if I had a chance to share here last night you would have been vomited on with information. His timing is always perfect. We are halfway finished with our eight week training course to become foster parents. We learn more each week and are thankful for this time to prepare for reality.
Yesterday was a veteran resource (the up-and-coming name to replace "foster" because of it negative association) parent who shared some of her story and what to expect from the experience. She and her husband have adopted three sibling sets through the foster care system in our county. She said they started fostering while they were waiting to get pregnant naturally after five years of marriage. After awhile they realized that this was God's plan for growing their family. They now have six kids who were all once foster children. She is a rock star.
I am not going to lie. She shared some scary stuff but it was all honest and helpful. After 20 years of fostering, she was a wealth of knowledge. And since each set of kids joined her family in twos (at varying age stages) she had experience to answer all kinds of questions. There were many joys too (which could still be considered scary).
She talked about how she kept a journal. My Love wrote a note on my paper reminding me of how I did that when I was a nanny years ago. It was amazing to see how far a 7 month year old had come after two years of writing down his daily milestones for his working parents. I am excited to have evidence of the miracles God will do in the lives of the children he places with us. We will celebrate every step in growth he allows us to witness.
She boldly made a statement I needed to hear clearly. "All of the children who have ever been placed with us have been sexually abused. And I would venture to guess is you lined up 90 foster parents, 89 of them would say the same thing." We aren't talking "most" anymore. This is something we will need to expect. (cue the freaking out grandparents). In the initial introductions, we mentioned our desire to keep with birth order (there are different schools of thought on the topic). To be honest I was still open to breaking open the box we might of be putting God in if they called us with an older child (but still preschool age). This woman agreed with the plan for our family. She thought the foster child should always be the youngest in the family with natural born children present. I think that confirmation solidified our hearts on the topic.
The stories she shared about the lives her children had before they came to her were heartbreaking. One woman was planning to give her son to her girlfriend as a gift so she put her friend's last name on the birth certificate. One woman (maybe the same one?) named her son Devil and told him he had the devil in him. His birth sister was named Angel. Um...yeah that would leave some lingering issues in a person. All of her kids had issues with food. One boy in particular would ask at every meal/snack IF they would eat again. And there have been attachment issues. One of their daughters has been in their family since 3 years old and is no 11 but she said is the least attached to them as parents. "It took six months before she smiled and boy did we celebrate that first one!"
She has had the benefit of decades of years behind her with some of the older kids. She knows had they stayed in the situations they were in they would have lived very different and hard lives. She admitted that they will each have issues for the rest of their lives. It is not like a warm bed and loving parents will cure any length of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. In fact, abuse sprung up in her household between an older boy and younger girl (cue freaking out me).
But something happened last night. I took in all the information and felt completely covered in prayer. There were no tears on the ride home this time, just praising God. The woman shared what her oldest son was up to now. At 28 he was married and doing well. However he is covered in tattoos and has gauges in his ears (not that there is anything wrong with that). But she described it as an outward expression of his unworthiness and his desire to keep reinventing himself to be loved. "Nothing will ever fill that void inside him," she said. I turned and looked toward My Love agreeing that we knew the One who could. "Except God!" she added after a short pause. I let out a whisper-yell from the back-ish row, "Amen!" And that is when it hit me. Satan would like nothing else but for us to panic and worry and fill our minds with anxious thoughts about the what-ifs. I choose not to do that. I choose to think about who God is and prepare ourselves to tell each child over and over and over who He says they are. I am completely ill-equipped to deal with any of the other abuse, but I know I can share God's love with a hurting child. His love is the only thing that will heal their wounds anyway. Hey. God's love! Isn't he amazing?! I have been studying the gospel of John this week and am excited to share all he has taught me that is changing my life about how I should be loving others. See you on Sunday about that one.
When I got in the car to drive home, a song came on the radio by Brandon Health called "Your Love". I cranked up the volume obnoxiously loud for the chorus. How does he do that?
But Your love
Your love
The only thing that matters is Your love
Your love is all I have to give
Your love is enough to light up the darkness
It’s Your love
Your love
all I ever needed is Your love
I am so thankful that I know His love and am excited to share it with the children we come to know and love in our home.
Our home study is this coming Monday. Keep praying. We feel each prayer lifted on our behalf.
I am sure if I had a chance to share here last night you would have been vomited on with information. His timing is always perfect. We are halfway finished with our eight week training course to become foster parents. We learn more each week and are thankful for this time to prepare for reality.
Yesterday was a veteran resource (the up-and-coming name to replace "foster" because of it negative association) parent who shared some of her story and what to expect from the experience. She and her husband have adopted three sibling sets through the foster care system in our county. She said they started fostering while they were waiting to get pregnant naturally after five years of marriage. After awhile they realized that this was God's plan for growing their family. They now have six kids who were all once foster children. She is a rock star.
I am not going to lie. She shared some scary stuff but it was all honest and helpful. After 20 years of fostering, she was a wealth of knowledge. And since each set of kids joined her family in twos (at varying age stages) she had experience to answer all kinds of questions. There were many joys too (which could still be considered scary).
She talked about how she kept a journal. My Love wrote a note on my paper reminding me of how I did that when I was a nanny years ago. It was amazing to see how far a 7 month year old had come after two years of writing down his daily milestones for his working parents. I am excited to have evidence of the miracles God will do in the lives of the children he places with us. We will celebrate every step in growth he allows us to witness.
She boldly made a statement I needed to hear clearly. "All of the children who have ever been placed with us have been sexually abused. And I would venture to guess is you lined up 90 foster parents, 89 of them would say the same thing." We aren't talking "most" anymore. This is something we will need to expect. (cue the freaking out grandparents). In the initial introductions, we mentioned our desire to keep with birth order (there are different schools of thought on the topic). To be honest I was still open to breaking open the box we might of be putting God in if they called us with an older child (but still preschool age). This woman agreed with the plan for our family. She thought the foster child should always be the youngest in the family with natural born children present. I think that confirmation solidified our hearts on the topic.
The stories she shared about the lives her children had before they came to her were heartbreaking. One woman was planning to give her son to her girlfriend as a gift so she put her friend's last name on the birth certificate. One woman (maybe the same one?) named her son Devil and told him he had the devil in him. His birth sister was named Angel. Um...yeah that would leave some lingering issues in a person. All of her kids had issues with food. One boy in particular would ask at every meal/snack IF they would eat again. And there have been attachment issues. One of their daughters has been in their family since 3 years old and is no 11 but she said is the least attached to them as parents. "It took six months before she smiled and boy did we celebrate that first one!"
She has had the benefit of decades of years behind her with some of the older kids. She knows had they stayed in the situations they were in they would have lived very different and hard lives. She admitted that they will each have issues for the rest of their lives. It is not like a warm bed and loving parents will cure any length of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. In fact, abuse sprung up in her household between an older boy and younger girl (cue freaking out me).
But something happened last night. I took in all the information and felt completely covered in prayer. There were no tears on the ride home this time, just praising God. The woman shared what her oldest son was up to now. At 28 he was married and doing well. However he is covered in tattoos and has gauges in his ears (not that there is anything wrong with that). But she described it as an outward expression of his unworthiness and his desire to keep reinventing himself to be loved. "Nothing will ever fill that void inside him," she said. I turned and looked toward My Love agreeing that we knew the One who could. "Except God!" she added after a short pause. I let out a whisper-yell from the back-ish row, "Amen!" And that is when it hit me. Satan would like nothing else but for us to panic and worry and fill our minds with anxious thoughts about the what-ifs. I choose not to do that. I choose to think about who God is and prepare ourselves to tell each child over and over and over who He says they are. I am completely ill-equipped to deal with any of the other abuse, but I know I can share God's love with a hurting child. His love is the only thing that will heal their wounds anyway. Hey. God's love! Isn't he amazing?! I have been studying the gospel of John this week and am excited to share all he has taught me that is changing my life about how I should be loving others. See you on Sunday about that one.
When I got in the car to drive home, a song came on the radio by Brandon Health called "Your Love". I cranked up the volume obnoxiously loud for the chorus. How does he do that?
But Your love
Your love
The only thing that matters is Your love
Your love is all I have to give
Your love is enough to light up the darkness
It’s Your love
Your love
all I ever needed is Your love
I am so thankful that I know His love and am excited to share it with the children we come to know and love in our home.
Our home study is this coming Monday. Keep praying. We feel each prayer lifted on our behalf.
Sunday, March 11, 2012
soap box: love
It has been awhile since I have stepped up here. You know, on my soap box. Every once in a while something becomes so passionate in me that I have to share so that I won't forget. If you aren't in the mood to hear me preach it, skip this one. It might be hard for some to read...
Love has been on my mind lately. Not romantic love, but real godly love. I think it probably sparked inside me during our foster parenting classes. What does it mean to really love someone like Christ did? Once I figure that out I think that is how I will choose to love the children who come to stay with us. Since we can have no expectation that our love will be returned, it has to be selfless and without conditions. This might be surprising, but some of the children might hate living with our family. I know. Shocking. But really we have to learn how to love them anyway. We have to model for them Christ's love.
As he often does, God started bringing up the topic of love to me through other people. First my friend, wrote this post. Then my former pastor started sharing devotional thoughts and scriptures about the idea of love on Facebook. This morning you guessed it, our pastor taught on love from the "love chapter", 1 Corinthians 13. Clearly God wants me to chew on the idea.
Unfortunately it has also brought my attention to feelings of disappointment in others. This would be the time when I could say "the American Christian church as a whole does not know what it means to love" but I won't. Well I guess I just did, but I won't elaborate. My thoughts have been thinking more close to home. We all give excuses why we can't love... I'm afraid of commitment. I have been lied to, cheated on, ignored. That guy really annoys me at work. My Dad wasn't there growing up. She gossips. He brings too much drama. I can't possibly forgive her. I'm busy. I'm busy. I'm busy.
I've heard so many excuses lately. Seriously people, you have to choose to love. First you have to know how Christ loved and then you just have to do it. You have to love EVERY ONE. Make effort. Really love them. Not be nice to most people but totally resent that one family member who hurt you. Not serve in your church but be rude to the tired waitress who mixed up your order. Not give up something for lent but just live in your own little world.
Do you know how easy it would have been for God to stay up in heaven and yet expect us to figure out how to come to him? But he didn't. He came to us and loved us in spite of ourselves. He showed us how to love. Really love. Why do we think any pile of excuses can give us a free pass to get out of really loving someone? Why do we let years pass by without making intentional connections with the people God have placed on our paths?
I challenge you to learn how Christ loved and do it. That is what I am going to do. Other than the Wednesday update after our foster care class, I won't be on here for the next week. I need to study what it means to love. Love my husband, my kids, my parents, my sisters, my in-laws, my neighbors, my far away friends, my soon-to-be friends, and every other person I see each day of my life. I need to really get this.
At the end of the week I would like to hear what you learned about the way Christ loved. Get ready to share because you know I will.
I'll close with a story I heard on the radio the other day. A woman was recalling her lunch with a friend who had lost her husband. She asked the recent widow what she would share with others who wanted to know how to help someone going through a similar tragedy. Her friend's response stuck with her. It went something like this... When someone suffers a loss don't tell them "let me know if you need anything". They can't even think about what they need in the next ten minutes while grieving much less be mindful enough to ask someone for help to meet it. Just do. Bring a meal, mow their lawn, pick up an extra gallon of milk at the store.
Love without waiting to be asked. Love before they seek your forgiveness. Love without even knowing their name.
Don't you think that is how God would want us to show his love to this lost and dying world in need of a Savior that we know? I do. And I want to be like that.
When did we make love about us instead of completely about HIM?
See you back here next Sunday.
Love has been on my mind lately. Not romantic love, but real godly love. I think it probably sparked inside me during our foster parenting classes. What does it mean to really love someone like Christ did? Once I figure that out I think that is how I will choose to love the children who come to stay with us. Since we can have no expectation that our love will be returned, it has to be selfless and without conditions. This might be surprising, but some of the children might hate living with our family. I know. Shocking. But really we have to learn how to love them anyway. We have to model for them Christ's love.
As he often does, God started bringing up the topic of love to me through other people. First my friend, wrote this post. Then my former pastor started sharing devotional thoughts and scriptures about the idea of love on Facebook. This morning you guessed it, our pastor taught on love from the "love chapter", 1 Corinthians 13. Clearly God wants me to chew on the idea.
Unfortunately it has also brought my attention to feelings of disappointment in others. This would be the time when I could say "the American Christian church as a whole does not know what it means to love" but I won't. Well I guess I just did, but I won't elaborate. My thoughts have been thinking more close to home. We all give excuses why we can't love... I'm afraid of commitment. I have been lied to, cheated on, ignored. That guy really annoys me at work. My Dad wasn't there growing up. She gossips. He brings too much drama. I can't possibly forgive her. I'm busy. I'm busy. I'm busy.
I've heard so many excuses lately. Seriously people, you have to choose to love. First you have to know how Christ loved and then you just have to do it. You have to love EVERY ONE. Make effort. Really love them. Not be nice to most people but totally resent that one family member who hurt you. Not serve in your church but be rude to the tired waitress who mixed up your order. Not give up something for lent but just live in your own little world.
Do you know how easy it would have been for God to stay up in heaven and yet expect us to figure out how to come to him? But he didn't. He came to us and loved us in spite of ourselves. He showed us how to love. Really love. Why do we think any pile of excuses can give us a free pass to get out of really loving someone? Why do we let years pass by without making intentional connections with the people God have placed on our paths?
I challenge you to learn how Christ loved and do it. That is what I am going to do. Other than the Wednesday update after our foster care class, I won't be on here for the next week. I need to study what it means to love. Love my husband, my kids, my parents, my sisters, my in-laws, my neighbors, my far away friends, my soon-to-be friends, and every other person I see each day of my life. I need to really get this.
At the end of the week I would like to hear what you learned about the way Christ loved. Get ready to share because you know I will.
I'll close with a story I heard on the radio the other day. A woman was recalling her lunch with a friend who had lost her husband. She asked the recent widow what she would share with others who wanted to know how to help someone going through a similar tragedy. Her friend's response stuck with her. It went something like this... When someone suffers a loss don't tell them "let me know if you need anything". They can't even think about what they need in the next ten minutes while grieving much less be mindful enough to ask someone for help to meet it. Just do. Bring a meal, mow their lawn, pick up an extra gallon of milk at the store.
Love without waiting to be asked. Love before they seek your forgiveness. Love without even knowing their name.
Don't you think that is how God would want us to show his love to this lost and dying world in need of a Savior that we know? I do. And I want to be like that.
When did we make love about us instead of completely about HIM?
See you back here next Sunday.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Thursday, March 8, 2012
our family anthem for 2012
I was going back to label some of my old posts and found this one I never published. It came at a time in early January when I was sharing other important song-videos and didn't want to have it get lost in the shuffle. I guess it is time to take a listen to the anthem I thought our family should follow into 2012. This one is for me.
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