When to start living? Love and Responsibility.

Love.

According to Merriam-Webster is… “a) a strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties; b) attraction based on sexual desire; [um I don’t think he’s referring to love here…maybe that one was misplaced in his -ary of diction?] c) affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests. “

According to my b-i-b-l-e… “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking. It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.” 1 Corinthians 13: 4-8

Wow. Talk about some varying definitions. I remember when I was younger, later elementary school years (Be prepared, what I am about to tell you is profound for elementary schoolers. However, my friend, Chelsea, and I were out to solve the world…and I think we could have done it. Eventually. Anyways…) I remember I was upset about some love situation in my life. Either I was having ‘boy issues’ …I know, it’s ridiculous. But what can I say, it definitely happens… or the more likely occurrence is my parents had a fight or something. Either way I was stuck on this passage from above and could not figure out why LOVE seemed so difficult when it was always patient and kind, not easily angered or self-seeking. How could it be that so many people who confessed to ‘love’ each other were always screwing up and making huge mistakes? I recall very vividly, in that moment, there being a ginormous light bulb going off in the room…the reason we (being people, humans, everyone.) always screw love up is because this is speaking of God’s love! Talk about an AH-HA moment…my world was forever changed. Maybe by that point in my life I should have already understood this, but it just hadn’t clicked yet. So on one hand you think…”Dang, if MY love for (_insert person or thing you care about here_) could be just ONE of those qualities all the time I would be so much better off!” On the other…isn’t it really incredible that our God’s love IS that way!!? All the time!? It’s humbling. So undeserving we are. We sang a song in church today and part of the chorus was…

“You are holy, great and mighty. The moon and the stars declare who You are. I’m so unworthy, but still You love me.”

Yay! I don’t know if there are words to explain how that makes me feel.

Where this came from you ask? Well I had a few different chats of varying seriousness and topics this weekend, but there was one thing I noticed…at times (sometimes more than I would like to admit) I am not patient, I am self-seeking, and I do keep a record of wrongs. Who am I to do these things to the people I love and adore? No one that has the right to do so.

So this is a reminder…for me. And for you. That #1. God is love. And #2. We’re not talking about our small, short-coming, and often times selfish love, but a HUGE love that is always kind, and never fails, always hopes, and never envies…and (Praise God!) keeps no record of wrongs. This is the love I wish for you and your family. So keep that in mind as you get angry, and start chalking up your tally marks for the day…be patient and kind…because through him all things are possible. Even loving to a deeper depth and in a richer way than you ever dreamed of.

And since I got so excited about Love tonight I’m not going to go into Andy Stanley’s talk from today about responsibility…but I will leave you with this…

“One person’s irresponsibility…eventually becomes another person’s responsibility.”

Seems pretty simple huh? Just chew on it, I’ll be back.

xxxoo -impractical dreaming.