I'm here at the library again - the view isn't fabulous or anything but I'm enjoying the quiet! I have about an hour before it closes, though, so I might finish this later...gotta get home and get dinner ready for one little one who will be eagerly waiting for food!
He stays busy allll day! It's no wonder he eats as much as he does!
I mentioned in the last blog post about how difficult the last few months have been. But what has been amazing to see is how God has been working through all of it. When everything was starting, I was pouring out my heart to a good friend...explaining that I felt like the spiritual baby of 1Hope. Or, well, maybe a toddler, but light years behind everyone else. I definitely don't feel mature. Her response? "Well, maybe this is the year you grow up." (This definitely has more of an "ouch!" factor when I write it out like that, but trust me, it was done in love...)
Now, while I certainly do not consider that I've grown up in the last two or three months (ha!) I can see God working in these trials. I'd say a consistent theme of even the last six months has been learning to love. Learning to love others, learning to love Him and rely first and foremost on Him, learning to love the Gospel in deeper ways than I have before.
What does it mean to love? I'm still figuring this out, but as far as I can tell, it's not so hard to love when it's something you want to do. Oh, don't get me wrong, the person doesn't have to be someone who is hurting you (although I've been there too), sometimes they can just be...boring. Really? You need a nappy change AGAIN? You're whining AGAIN? (Yes, I grasp the irony of complaining about complaining, and more often than not the reason I'm singing the "Do Everything Without Complaining" song is not so much for the whiny toddler as it is for myself!) It doesn't have to be a...
Ok, here is the point where I had a great second half and the poor library wifi didn't back it up and I came home and accidentally closed the wrong tab and lost it all and then people were playing loud music and I had to fight the temptation to not completely contradict everything I'm writing today...
...just keeping it real...
The person who is hard to love doesn't have to be someone who is deliberately difficult. It could be a whiny toddler or a screaming baby. It could be that new person at church, or the person you've known forever but never really talk to or get to know. It could be someone who disagrees with you, someone who pushes your buttons even when they aren't trying, someone who has different expectations of your behavior than you do. (Cross-cultural ministry for sure!) It could be someone who actually is sinning against you, although it might be someone who isn't. More often than not, if I find someone difficult to love, I find that has more to do with myself and my own heart than with the other person.
So, what does love look like? 1 Corinthians 13 does an excellent job of explaining, and I won't presume to improve upon it, but it might be helpful to see how it plays out in daily life. It doesn't always look like warm, fuzzy feelings, in fact, often it doesn't, although those are nice and I appreciate them when they are there.
For me, love looks (or should look) a lot like...
...cleaning up vomit for the fourth time in a meal, without losing my temper, even when I have a sneaking suspicion the child is making himself throw up on purpose.
...pursuing reconciliation when I sense a breach in the relationship, even if it means I have to be a little awkward and admit my own failure.
...not getting irritated when someone shoves me away from the sink yet again without asking. (I'm not sure if this is a cultural thing, or a byproduct of having four people perpetually cooking four different meals in the kitchen all at the same time...)
...not losing it when someone screams for an hour at 2 am. (The someone is a one year old, not an adult, just in case you were wondering. Although after a while one does feel like crying along with them!)
...answering a thousand questions in a day, even ones that seem super obvious.
...accepting that my culture doesn't always have the one right way to do things.
...loving people even when they intentionally sin against me.
...not letting someone's behavior determine whether or not I show kindness and love to them.
...cleaning up a lot of bodily fluids.
...saying goodbye to a baby when I know it's for their best.
...loving a baby even when I know I'm going to have to say goodbye.
...giving lots of rides. Not ALL the rides, but lots of rides.
...eating meals together.
...asking questions, good ones, that clue me in to how someone's life is really going.
...washing someone's dishes, even if I rarely see them washing my dishes.
...showing grace. Helping clean up messes that don't belong to me, not just physical messes, although believe me, I clean up a lot of those too.
...patience, trusting God to change someone and knowing I can't.
...looking for ways to spend time with people.
...not answering back when I'm irritated.
...telling someone I love them and encouraging them. Life is too short to keep your mouth shut when you shouldn't. Look at how Paul wrote to the churches! I've been memorizing Philippians and this strikes me.
...refraining from gossip.
...believing the best.
...making an effort to build friendships with people I don't naturally click with.
...not being shocked by sin, but remembering that my sin, too, put Christ on the cross. Loving through pain. By loving someone, I may be willingly taking on a hurtful situation, one where I am hurt again and again, but really, I had someone who took the nails for me. Any pain I experience is far less, and it is a privilege to be able to share His suffering even in a small way. God gives grace, and endurance, and joy.
...doing the hard or awkward or inconvenient thing, the thing that encroaches into my free time. Giving of my time and my money and my resources and my life.
...speaking the Truth, because the Word of God is living and active and more powerful than any two-edged sword, because God alone has the power to bring the dead to life, the power to change hearts, and He uses His Word to work miracles. Speaking the Truth because the Gospel is beautiful and I want to see redemption, to see something beautiful, to watch as God takes my breath away.
...speaking the Truth even when I don't see the results, and trusting God with it.
...giving of my emotional energy until I am left feeling so drained I realize only Christ can fill me...and, to be honest, there's no better place to be than in realization of my full reliance on Him. I rest, yes, but I have to remember where my deepest rest lies.
...resting in Christ and going to sleep in peace because I know that I can trust him with whatever tomorrow brings in my relationships with others...even if I sometimes struggle to believe that.
"Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." Philippians 3:12-14
