Love

I looked up the definition of love today. Here is what http://www.m-w.com/ said:

Love - 1 a (1): strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties (2): attraction based on sexual desire : affection and tenderness felt by lovers (3): affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests b: an assurance of love 2: warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion 3 a: the object of attachment, devotion, or admiration b (1): a beloved person : darling —often used as a term of endearment (2)British —used as an informal term of address4 a: unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another: as (1): the fatherly concern of God for humankind (2): brotherly concern for others b: a person's adoration of God5: a god or personification of love6: an amorous episode : love affair7: the sexual embrace : copulation8: a score of zero (as in tennis)9capitalized Christian Science : god
— at love
: holding one's opponent scoreless in tennis
— in love
: inspired by affection

Okay, so if you didn't read all that, no problem. There's a lot of definitions of love...but what stands out to me is how I define love. How I've defined it in relation to and in opposite of Merriem-Webster's definition of it.

I have "loved" a lot, in many ways. But I don't love all the time...there are times that I feel anger and hurt and indifference. But I can still love in those times...God does. For as much as we test him, hurt him, turn away from him, disobey him, He still finds ways to love us at all times...unconditional.

My job is to love Him and others the same way. Do I do that? I don't really know. I'm too human to make that judgement of myself or others. But what I do know is that I love Him, I love my family and friends, my co-workers, ets and all the kids I know. And one thing that I do know about myself is that I've never been "in love" with any man. That was a revelation to me earlier today. God has helped me to not fall "in love" with the wrong men. The closest man I ever truly loved (in the "in love" sense) was years ago; it wasn't my last boyfriend or any of the guys I've dated since or just before. And though there have been times where I've been frustrated with my singleness, wondering if I'll ever be enough for any man, it's this that I am so greatful of: I haven't loved the wrong man. I am waiting; being patient; praying for; and trusting that God is preparing the right man for me...or the right single path. Even at 33...He could be calling me to singleness like Paul. I don't feel that at all; but I need to keep it an option. I want to want always what God wants; not what my humanity wants.

So today I learned a lot more about love...read Matthew 22:36-40 again...and that it's worth waiting for my One True Love to show me who my one true earthly love is. :-)

In the meantime, I can practice loving God's people genuinely and in abundance. It's always good practice to love.

Centerpiece

I started to sing yesterday...out loud in public. Yes, I did. This morning, I sang most of the time I walked Theda. I don't remember seeing anyone but I sang. It was such a release. And I remembered the hymns, too! But one song I couldn't remember and it bothers me now.

It's called "Centerpiece" and was written by a former worship minister of mine. It is honestly one of my most favorite songs ever. Honestly, I will make sure it's played during my wedding ceremony (whenever that happens). But this morning as I was walking and singing what I could remember, all jumbled up...it got me to thinking all day long about my Centerpiece; about how well I let my Centerpiece control my life...and how well I don't, but let others.

I've been reading and listening to five different "preachers." I've compared what they say about Biblical principles; and what they agree on or don't. It's been a little rough at times to discern...and I can see that during those rough times I acted out a bit or had a mini-freak out on a friend, or went to this selfish place (or what came across as being selfish). But I see why I reacted those ways: I was worrying too much about trying to consolidate everyone's viewpoint into one somehow that I could believe in but not focusing on the one thing that I needed to: and that was making sure my Centerpiece was in control...not someone else or some spiritual philosophy. Because I see so clearly that God is the only one that truly matters. His words are life. Yes, we need some people to help us get through some things, but we shouldn't end up "following" them...we have to keep following God. Because not everyone who we look up to is going to be right all the time about everything concerning God. They will be wrong at times. But one thing that I know clearly is that God will always steer you right. He will speak to you through prayer, meditation, fasting, solitude, silence, journaling, nature, people and even directly with words (I've heard him actually talk to me three times before clear as day)....you just have to be available. That's it. You have to make yourself available to Him, and Him only.

I've read a lot of books lately....but there isn't one that everything in it is right (even if I love the author or agree with most of what's in the book). Not one. When I go to the one book that counts, The Bible, and study what I'm not sure about: I'm either led to it being correct or wrong. I can't always trust people to be right all the time. It's not possible; we're too human.

But I can trust my Centerpiece. As a believer, a Christian, a Jesus-follower...whatever label you want to give me...I've been given the Holy Spirit and the grace and the wisdom to discern what is right and what is wrong. My Holy Spirit will steer me right. I have faith that no matter where I am in life, my Spirit is with me, guiding me to learn and know more about Him; growing in faith in His will; learning to love unconditionally like Him; and remembering that He is my Centerpiece.

And I need to add nothing to my Centerpiece. It's all there; everything that I need and nothing I don't. I will never understand why so many of us put so many parameters on our faith; why there is so much dis-unity in the church (not one in particular; just in general between denominations); or why we can't all love each other like God tells us, too...why we all have people, some who are friends, that we can't find common ground with. Why, if we're supposed to be unique but loving to those different than us, we can't see each others differences as beautiful? It's just so hard to understand some things.

But one thing that I do understand is that He is my Centerpiece; He's at the core of who I am; Not up or down or even off to one side.........Come, Father, take your rightful place in my life: always in the Center.

Okay...so you can see I remember only half the chorus. But I will remember the rest...especially when I get the CD from home tomorrow. :-)

Come Thou Fount...

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount!
I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy redeeming love.

(My favorite verse)
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be!
Let that grace now like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here's my heart, Lord,
O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

Here's my heart, Lord, take and seal it. Seal it for Thy courts above. :-)

By Your Side

Why are you striving these days
Why are you trying to earn grace
Why are you crying
Let me lift up your face
Just don't turn away
Why are you looking for love
Why are you still searching as if I'm not enough
To where will you go child
Tell me where will you run
To where will you run
And I'll be by your side
Wherever you fall
In the dead of night
Whenever you call
And please don't fight
These hands that are holding you
My hands are holding you
Look at these hands and my side
They swallowed the grave on that night
When I drank the world's sin
So I could carry you in
And give you life
I want to give you life(Chorus 2x)
Cause I, I love you
I want you to know
That I, I love you
I'll never let you go

The above are lyrics to a song by Tenth Avenue North that has been my favorite since it came out. Every lyric speaks to me and in my recent times of uncertainty, before and after posts on facebook, or notes on my blog or just while driving to work in the early morning, I would hear it. It would play in my car or it would pop into my head. Words inspired by God to a band to write and then to release on the radio, and then to reach people who need to hear the words....for those words to inspire that person (or persons) to pray, to seek, to love, to cry, to let go, to read verses, to change their disposition to one of worship, praise and complete joy from despair, uncertainty or general sadness and depression. This is poetry; the real poetry. Not just words on a page ordered creatively...but real connection and emotion and growth in the real world to a place in the eternal world. Poetry...in it's greatest form...inspires creation to look up to it's Creator.

This song is one of my inspirations to seek The Poet. It's poetry that has gotten me to settle within minutes, instead of hours or days, reminding me of the hands that are holding me; of how those hands are the only ones I need. The only love I really need. The only love that can ever exceed all my expectations. The only love that will truly always be by my side; that drank the world's sin and gave me true and everlasting life; that is carrying me in...to Heaven.

I am alive.
I am blessed.
I am forgiven.
I am loved, eternally.

Sunday Revelations

Today, I was caught off guard and overwhelmed by God. There is a peace in me that I haven't felt in a long while. I also have not been genuinely emotional like this morning in some time. Before I knew it, I was teary-eyed and singing with a shaky voice because God touched my heart so that I couldn't contain such joy and relief! It was something that I needed so much...and it came in His time, I am most certain of it.

Three of the biggest questions I've been asking in the last six months or so were answered...within 20 minutes of each other! They are not important to list here but they all have one thing in common: they all have to do with my purpose and future. I have been so lost; the picture has been so unclear. And now, I feel like I belong and that there is stable ground under my feet again. Of course, there are details that need to be worked out...but I know without a doubt what I am supposed to do now and how I am supposed to accomplish it.

Everything that I've been learning in my solitude, prayer time, walking outside, personal Bible studies and my Tuesday night Bible study has been sewn together to create this tapestry of amazing beauty. It's not finished but the pieces are there for me to work with; to fit together; and to shape for the benefit of others around me. It is going to be a gorgeous work of art...but it isn't going to be by my hands. It's going to be God using my hands to sew so delicately into one piece.

I'm so excited...and sooo at peace now. It's such an awesome feeling.

Of course, not all the questions are answered; but I have no doubts and complete faith that those "little things" will be worked out by His crafty hands. No doubt. :-)

More Saturday Confessions...

Ha Ha! I just picked up Matthew again and read Chapter 22: 43-44. Jesus is answering the pharisees on who David is compared to Himself....but I immediatley thought about my journal entry from Bible study last Tuesday. Only my friends Alisa and Carrie have read it but this passage helps to surmise what He wanted to say to me:

43 He said to them, “How then does David in the Spirit call Him ‘Lord,’ saying:
44 ‘ The LORD said to my Lord,
“ Sit at My right hand,
Till I make Your enemies Your footstool”’?[a]

Ha Ha...God is sooo clever! In my journal, I'm walking on Jesus' right side down the shoreline and alligators are snapping at my feet but my feet disappear and they have nothing to bite. Ha Ha! What a picture of Matthew 22:43-44! God makes my enemies my footstool when I walk with Him hand in hand. Cool!

So now I really have no reason to not be me and be who I am supposed to be! He has my back, or my feet - as the verse and my journal tells it. :-) Too cool!

Saturday Confessions

It's a lazy day today for me. I had some personal plans to do...clean my apartment, do a little more organizing, paint (which I may still do), write, play Frisbee Golf with friends at 4 p.m....but right now, I am making no plans...except to write the following: (I'll let God work the rest of my day.)

Through the ups and downs of my alone times and life changes recently, I am beginning to see a pattern to the uncertainty and the convictions that I've recently seen in myself and others. There's one thing that stands out: it's not about us. It's about doing what we can, being what we need to for others. Okay, so that isn't a new realization...but it's not just about the normal "serving" things. It's about doing the things like Nelson Mandel did for South America; Martin Luther King, Jr., did in this country; it's about how Ryan White fought so courageously in his young life; it's about how we now wear yellow LiveStrong arm bands as inspired by Lance Armstrong. It's about that inner specialness (yes, I made a new word), that inner genuinity, that inner uniqueness that God has given each of us, to use to affect this world for the better. It's about getting up and doing...and not sitting and waiting for the just the right time or right answer when you know what you've been given. It's not unreasonable to wait for a "yes"; but if there isn't a no, why does that stop us? Why can't we use what we've been given in each moment in every day to affect the world around us? Why do we wait for the yes when we know what we've been given is good?

I've been the biggest example of this hypocracy that I know. Instead of doing, I'm hemming and hawing at what I don't have anymore; the changes in relationships that have occured in the last year; the worrying about why, if I did/said/written something wrong; the wondering if I'm ever gonna be loved like I should be by a man or love a man like I know I can and should; and just the basic wondering what my future holds when I see so many of everyone else's futures (namely, three couple friends will or should be getting married soon; others are having more kids; others are content with their singleness or thier dating; and still others have career/serving paths that have real purposes). Why do I let all of that get to me?

I made a comment to a friend last night about being "over" something. I said it in gentle frustration, but I really meant it, too. If the thing that I'm frustrated over isn't really going to end my life or my relationship with Christ, why does it matter so much to me? This situation or person has their own items/life with all its ups and downs...and it doesn't have to include me, even if I want to be included. Though it's unfortunate to have the change, I don't see it as anything that should be holding me back or making me feel like the person or friend that I am isn't enough anymore. I am enough just the way I am, just where I am; I always have been and I always will be...and I know that God has been with me all this time and will be with me every step in the future. No matter how many mistakes I make or successes, He knows my heart and my love for Him and my uniqueness better than anyone else. There is no judgement from any human being - friend, family or foe - that can ever take my relationship with Him away from me for any reason.

Why have I been so worried about that? Wow...I've wasted so much time trying to please everyone and to be the perfect Christian and follower of Christ that I wasn't being who God made me. Namely:

I'm a dancer; I'm a writer; I'm a painter; I'm a dreamer; I'm silly and can be an absolute dork sometimes. I can be frustrating to some and a Godsend to others. I love to cook for my friends and just love food in general. I love to help a friend in need or be there to comfort them; and love that they trust me and call me and share with me their unhappy or deliriously exciting moments. I make mistakes and learn a little slower than others at times. I may be a dancer but I'm also a clutz. I love dogs; accept cats. I love tigers and sea lions. I love to hang outside with my friends, talk sports with the guys, play poker/cards, joke and tease with them. I love to get mani-pedi's, throw dinner parties, take long walks, talk at all hours and giggle with my girlfriends. I never feel homesick when on a mission trip...seriously, I never have...but He hasn't called me yet to full time missionary work in the "going to another country" sense. I cry anytime I see anything on tv or from a friends stories about people with hardships, knowing I can do something but I don't know what or how...or have the desire to get off my couch and go do something. I do love people even when it gets hard to love them; I could never truly desire for anyone to be hurt out of spite. I know I'd be devastated for them; even if I'd been very angry for awhile, God knows I would not seek out to give them harm or for revenge. I know that God is always with me even if I let myself forget sometimes; He is always there, it's me who isn't. I'm not good with finances; but I know that I have the capacity to learn and get better and am doing so. I know that I'm smarter in a lot of ways than my friends; but I also know that they are smarter than me in a lot of ways...and that that's what makes it so good...that you can share and help each other, and not be jealous of what others have. Though, I also know that I can be jealous, too, at times because I am a human being and that God can be jealous, too...when I choose something else over Him, He wants me to Himself. But He lets me decide anyway, choosing more to love me than to give in to His jealousy. And it's in all that that I know who I am right now is who I should be, not that I can't change or won't, but that I just need to be me and let God fix and handle the rest. And that in the beginning and at the end of the day it's all about what Jesus told us in Matthew 22:36-40:

36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” 37 Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’[d] 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’[e] 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

On a rainy Saturday, these are my confessions...and it all can be rolled up into one:

I am okay with who I am because it was God's hands who have sewn me together. I am hand sewn by Him.

And I have a poem on that; maybe sometime I will share it but not today. But that's also who I am: open, but at times mysterious, vague and un-sharing. All of which I am in this blog today.

But in conclusion to all these confessions is my thought for this day: I know who I am...so it's time for me to start showing it. :-)

The beginning of my first novel...

Adam was only six when it happened. That was 15 years ago. His parents never recovered and he was caught between them. The newspaper clipping read, “Wealthy six year old orphaned by suicide.” It couldn’t have been a sadder story; or easier for the media to feast on.

***************

Michael sat and did as he was told but all the while he thought. He thought about her and who she was now. He just couldn’t put his finger on it. What was going on? Then he realized what he was eating was incredible. Stop thinking, Michael, he told himself. Just eat the delicious food from the lady and go to bed. Lady? Where did that come from, he thought. She’d never belonged in that category before…and he’s not sure he should put her there now…or at least, yet.

***************

Okay, so these paragraphs need a lot of work...but they are two of about 13 that are started. The idea is there...just not all the details. But they are coming better now than they ever have. I just need to not be scared...and write whenever I'm inspired to even if it's the middle of the night, or beginning of the morning...like now. :-)

Okay, that's all you get. Back to it...then to bed when I'm too tired to write. :-)

I am thinking...

...about starting a second blog. The new one would be just for fun stories and poems that I come up with. It's funny but lately I've been thinking in "story terms." Okay, so that's my lingo...what it means is that somebody will talk about something or I'll be having a conversation or just see something funny and this story comes in my head about it. I know, kinda sounds a little strange but it's also kinda fun. I also feel so much more like myself when I'm being creative like that; and that includes when I am dancing, swimming, painting or just doing anything creative. I'm so much happier and feel so much more real when I'm in those moments. But I also lose them kinda quickly...so having a second blog just for creating stories I think would be so good for me. I'm not sure how much of it I would publish or if I should...but it's definitely a consideration.