In the past week or so I have had the same conversation with two different friends in different states so I thought I would share a little about the topic... Actually this is quite different from my normal blog posts, but hey, it's my blog so I can post whatever it is that I want to post! Anyway, the first part of this post is actually a entry from my journal on July 12, 2009:
" *'Love is in the house, and the house is packed. So much soul I left the back door cracked. Mamma always said it's a matter of fact When love is in the house the house is packed...'- TobyMac
*'I wanna know what love is...'- Foreigner
*'Love, true love...'
What is love?
For a long time I have (and still to some degree still do) struggle with the fact of 'love'. I personally have never been able to really define love- I really have never known what love is. Very rarely do the words 'I love you' come out of my mouth and sometimes when they do, they are just empty words with no meaning behind them. I simply have struggled with love. It often gets under my skin when people carelessly toss around the phrase 'I love you.' When couples of two weeks repeatedly exchange the phrase I stop and ask myself, 'do they really know what love is or are they just saying it because that's the thing to say?' There are random people in my life who every time I see them say 'I love you', but do they really love me? Do they understand true love? Am I the only odd ball who just doesn't get it??? Needless to say 'I love you's' are few and far between with me, but I'm thinking that's all changing now.
A few weeks ago as I was having my quiet time before work I was praying over kidz kamp and the material we had just finished writing. As I was praying and thinking through the stuff we had written I was silenced in an awe-struck humbling moment. I thought about how incredible this material (and material in the past) was. WOW...I am a dirty, unworthy, no good for nothing sinner, but yet God used me. I could not begin to understand why God still chose to use me cause I was a worthless sinner, then it hit me...LOVE.
God loves me so much that #1 He forgives me, but #2 He wants to use me. Many times in my life I have pretty much looked Him straight in the face and spit it in, slapped Him, and then turned and walked away. What did He do? He pretty much grabbed me, hugged me, cleaned me up, and used me.
As all of this hit me I began to weep-hard. I finally got what love was. Looking through the outside and the actions and loving the person no matter what. Not only loving them when it's convenient, but loving them when they hate you. Not only showing love, but empowering them and supporting them in the darkest times.
Love is giving it all, all the time, through it all, in all circumstances, with all that you are."
So what does sunglasses have to do with this?
You see a few weeks ago I was at the lake with a group of friends and we went into a cove, anchored the boats, and just hung out in the water and swam. I had my rather expensive Oakley sunglasses on, but decided to swim about 75 yards to my families boat to get my life jacket. So I handed my sunglasses to my bf and asked them to hold them for me. I swam to the boat and as I was almost back to my group of friends floating in the water I heard "Where are the sunglasses?" As I looked up I saw a couple of the guys diving down and realized my nice sunglasses are now somewhere in the lake... Not cool in my world. My friend had now entered the panic stage and well, to be quite honest, I had entered the pissed stage. After a few dives down, I counted it a lost cause and swam over to the side of the boat and just kind of sat there for a while. After a few minutes I sucked it up, joined the group again and tried to let it go. I said it was all cool, but it really wasn't I just wanted to give some kind of comfort to my friend and not be mad towards them any more.
A few hours went by and we were headed home. As I drove my friends in my car carried on many conversations, but I was in my own pissy little world harping on the fact that a giant catfish was now swimming around in style. I was was sulking in my loss and I thought about my friend and how bad they must feel... I knew that there was no way to go back and change what happened, but I could change my attitude towards the whole situation. I began to feel guilty for the anger that I had felt and then God and I had a cool moment... LOVE was made real. I still love my friend even though they dropped my sunglasses. The glasses were just an overpriced piece of plastic, but my friend is a priceless treasure. I'm not going to stop loving them because of what happened, even though I must admit the thought did cross my mind. Just being honest. That's how God's love is... Never ending. If God stopped loving me every time I did something that upset Him or went against what He asked me to do, quite frankly He would never love me. But He loves me no matter what I do to Him and I just don't understand. As Christians it's time to start loving like God does. He gives it all, all the time, through it all, in every circumstance, and loves us with all that He is...
I don't know about you, but I sure am glad that God loves me now matter how many times I "drop His sunglasses in the lake." Maybe it's time we start doing the same thing.
Pressing On.
...thanks...
