this love theme....

I'm the worst offender in overusing the word and cheapening it to a superficial add-on in a sentence. I can't seem to get away from this theme. So now I'm on a quest and going deeper.

Yes, I LOVE chocolate, especially on certain days.
I LOVE my '64 VW bug named "Frappy", I LOVE the color.
I LOVE sunny days and the ocean waves.
I LOVE training and doing sprint triathlons....Yeah, I love it all.

Although most everyone probably understands that my 'love' for these things is not equally distributed and may even vary from day to day (I hate chocolate on those days when I'm prone to indulge in overeating it and trying to watch sugar intake; I'm less in love with Frappy when she's being an old car and acting 'crappy'.....Did she forget her name? Supposed to be happy!) - I want to clarify that in most of these situations my 'love' is more a very strong like and I guess it doesn't leave much room for going after authentic love.

So I'm getting off the superficial train ride for a minute. I want to stop off in the field of love and graze awhile. What does it look like? After listening to Ravi's podcast yesterday, I was reminded that even my 'best' efforts to love people fall so short. I don't know the first thing about love. If genuine, authentic love begins with a genuine, authentic God and his definition, that it has to do with our intrinsic worth no matter what we bring to the table, then that's the field I need to stop and graze in for awhile.

Why am I so motivated today to pursue this line of thought?
Well, every once in awhile I get stirred in my thoughts and realize that
1) this life is short.
2) what's the purpose?

And then I come back to a simple faith. As a Christ-follower, He showed us how to keep it simple. Love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Love others, even your neighbors, as yourself. Sounds simple right? Not when your definition of love is superficial. And that's where the train wreck was in sight for me again today. So, I needed to get off and let that train continue without me.

Here's what I discovered. I'm often trapped in my own mind and my own perception of what love looks like. I have no idea how to live outside of myself and my own ways. And then I'm reminded of a small sentence I've read before "God is love."
And then I open up the love chapter to read about "the way of love" in 1 Cor 13. My memory is jolted and I find myself shaving off layers of superficial 'love' that often pervades my life.

Let me just share it with you

"If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God's word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day and if I ahve faith that says to a mountain, "Jump" and it jumps, but I don't have love, I'm nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.
Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
Love doesn't strut,
Doesn't have a swelled head,
Doesn't force itself on others,
Isn't always 'me first'
Doesn't fly off the handle,
Doesn't keep score of the sins of others
Doesn't revel when others grovel
takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.
Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; ...understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.....but for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love."

More times than I care to recount, my life is filled with everything opposite of this. I speak words eloquently and because words are a big part of the way I express myself as an extrovert, I find myself doing this a lot. What about the times when there's no love behind it. I may even share things that are true and make it plain but my heart isn't in it. My faith is strong but when there's no authentic love there, I'm empty. And just like this text reads, alot of times I associate 'love' or being loving with doing good deeds - helping someone in need, helping the poor. Working with missions and sending students to the least reached areas of the world, I'm inspired by stories of missionaries who have been burned at the stake for their faith. They may have been walking in love, but me? Hmmmm. How deep is it really pulsing through my veins?

No matter what I say, what I believe, what I do -- If I am without God's love pumping, pounding and pulsing through my veins, I am bankrupt. I lose everything! If God is love and if HE is what I need pumping, pounding and pulsing through my veins, then this is a glimpse of what I am asking God to renew in my heart.

His love never gives up. He cares more for others than I do. He doesn't strut even his goodness for others to see but unfolds His love in subtle, humble ways. He doesn't force himself on others. He doesn't fly off the handle, doesn't keep score of the sins of others and takes pleasure in seeing authenticity and truth. He puts up with anything and He always looks for the best. He ALWAYS looks for the best. Wow. Do I? God never looks back, but keeps going to the end.

And lest I give up hope in this quest, I'm reminded that everything I say and do is incomplete until the day things are completed and finished in me, the day I die, I guess. For now, I have three things to do. Trust steadily, hope unswervingly and love extravagantly.

I don't think I'll ever master this quest but I want to renew the depths of authentic love and make it a lifetime goal. It's good to remember my incompleteness and His perfection. It's good to get off the train once in awhile, stop and graze on the good stuff. Love is the good stuff and that's what I want in life.

The topic of love

Today I opened up an old podcast from Ravi Zacharias "Just Thinking" on the topic of love. Ravi travels to university campuses and interacts with students on various topics relating to Christianity. If you've never listened to one of his "Just Thinking" podcasts, I recommend it to challenge your thought processes in regards to faith in Christ and how that plays out in this world. Although ultimately, my faith in Christ is something even a child could understand, I enjoy being challenged to think about my faith critically.

On this particular podcast, he was talking at Kansas State University and a student asked Ravi why he holds the opinion that God alone fulfills the human need for love and defines love. Why can't we find it amongst our fellow man or in other sources?

Ravi answered that if a person loves his fellow man, obviously that can be a good thing but if it's left to this, there is no "rationally justifiable basis for everyone else who chooses to go a different route". Basically, Ravi is saying that when you come to that conclusion to be loving or not loving on your own basis, as a rational human being, then love becomes relative. Ravi used the example of the Third Reich who came up with their own conclusions on human worth. There will always be racism and the thought that some people should be wiped out. Obviously, there is no unanimous definition among human beings on human worth and love. For some people love is not defined the same. He talked about when you just hold to an autonomous view, based on your personal perspective, it leaves room for the atrocities we've seen throughout history. Religious groups that are fighting or believe that other groups should be eradicated based on certain things and on and on. (And yes, as I was listening, this made me think also of the atrocities that were done in the "name of Christ" throughout the years....Obviously the understanding of love and being a Christ-follower was not being expressed here either).

But Ravi went on to say that when you love from a non-theistic point of view, when you leave God out of the equation, people are just living above what they can legitimize and bring to the table. I guess you could say that's humanity living to legitimize love according to what's comfortable for them.

As Ravi says,
"Their conclusion may be right but their reasoning is only self-driven. And if that is the case than a person who comes to a different conclusion by being self-driven and reasoning, actually the world views will collide at some point. What is love? Love is when you treat a person with intrinsic worth, not only when they serve your purpose. There is no intrinsic worth in a naturalistic framework. Peter Singer has gone on record interviewed again this week that if a child is born with down-syndrome or whatever, you know, that maybe he should be eliminated, no more value than a pig. You know, wipe these creatures off the face of the earth. My goodness, me! Can you not see where this leads and where this natural selection actually becomes unnatural selection and transcends other cultures. What I say to you is that the only way you can be a creature of intrinsic worth is if God has fashioned you and God has created you, a transcending moral order. And I love you, even when you choose not to get along with me or not to agree with me. That love is the bequest of God."

Although Ravi was answering this student's question of why God needs to be in the equation for a love definition, honestly, I was convicted even in my own world. I don't always do the best job at living out authentic, genuine love and I was convicted.

I was also reminded that in the midst of a historical record full of mistakes (including mine) and full of human conclusions on the issue of love, we have a savior who transcends all of these accounts. It was his death on the cross that was the greatest expression of authentic love based on nothing more than the fact that each individual walking this earth is a creature of intrinsic worth. And from his perspective, Jesus took all the hostility, all the animosity, all the naturalistic beliefs about love and pounded them into the ground. Instead, he said "Forgive them. They don't know what they're doing."

I know I don't love like Jesus loved. I know I have personal preferences, judgments, attitudes that are the furthest thing from Christ's point of view and sometimes I wonder how this amazingly loving and powerful God still puts up with me! Sometimes I just wish there was a washing machine where the only ingredient was God's pure love. I wish I could put myself in there and turn on the wash cycle, get off all the crud and come out with only God's pure love. Those moments when I really know that I am living out that kind of love seem to be few and far between sometimes, yet I won't give up. I find it happens most when I sit in a quiet place and reflect on Him, His nature, His qualities, His attributes. Then I ask him to change my heart to be more like his, because frankly, my heart sucks. I know He's doing it but some days it's more obvious than others.

As I finished writing this blog, Seal's song "Love's Divine" came on and I found myself singing along.....

Then the rainstorm came, over me
And I felt my spirit break
I had lost all of my, belief you see
And realized my mistake
But time through a prayer, to me
And all around me became still

I need love, love's divine
Please forgive me now I see that I've been blind
Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name

Through the rainstorm came sanctuary
And I felt my spirit fly
I had found all of my reality
I realize what it takes

'Cause I need love, love's divine
Please forgive me now I see that I've been blind
Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name

Oh I, don't bet (don't bend), don't break (don't break)
Show me how to live and promise me you won't forsake
'Cause love can help me know my name

Well I try to say there's nothing wrong
But inside I felt me lying all along
But the message here was plain to see
Believe me

'Cause I need love, love's divine
Please forgive me now I see that I've been blind
Give me love, love is what I need to help me know my name

Oh I, don't bet (don't bend), don't break (don't break)
Show me how to live and promise me you won't forsake
'Cause love can help me know my name

Love can help me know my name.

The tension of Trust

I come from a family of eternal optimists, atleast on my mom's side. It doesn't matter what the situation, it seems we are always reasoning from a place of hope and positivity. I guess that can be a good thing, mostly when it doesn't blindside you. It's good to look for the good and not dwell on all the negative things out there. In fact, as a Christ-follower, I think it's actually biblical....Hmmmm.

But in addition to being an eternal optimist, over time I've learned to be a realist when it comes to people. I'm not bitter about that. To act as a realist with people is to practice accepting a situation as it is and then be prepared to deal with it accordingly, still believing the best, still reasoning from a place of hope and positivity. I haven't always been a realist. This is something that's developed over time and I've found that it's actually served to strengthen my capacity to love and extend grace in situations and through disappointments that otherwise I would not have been able to handle.

Trust is a fragile thing, especially when it comes to our relationships. We were created to live in that dynamic, fragile tension of human existence and trust is a part of that. Where I used to trust people and their ability to do what they say or be who I thought they were, I can now trust that no matter what an individual says or does, God can work things into anyone whose willing. For me, the subtle difference is I'm trusting God in the midst of human existence. What I mean is that people can and will let you down but we all do it, because it's part of that element called humanity. So I've learned to trust God to get to the heart of the matter and be in the mix.

A few mornings ago I was reading in Jeremiah 17:5-13 in The Message/Remix version of the Bible. James calls this my rapper version of the Bible. I love the way it reads.
"cursed is the strong one who depends on mere humans, who thinks he can make it on muscle alone and sets God aside as dead weight. He's like a tumbleweed on the prairie, out of touch with the good earth. He lives rootless and aimless in the land where nothing grows. But blessed is the man who trusts you, God, the woman who sticks with God. They're like trees replanted in Eden, putting down roots near the river. Never a worry through the hottest of summers, never dropping a leaf, serene and calm through droughts, bearing fresh fruit every season. The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful, a puzzle that no one can figure out. But I, God, search the heart and examine the mind. I get to the heart of the human. I get to the root of things. I treat them as they really are, not as they pretend to be. All who leave you end up as fools, deserters with nothing to show for their lives, who walk off from God, fountain of living waters and wind up dead."

There is a tension between trusting people and ultimately trusting God, realizing that every day we build relationships with people but to put all our confidence and dependence in those human relationships, will ultimately keep us out of touch with the reality of the human condition. No person can fulfill everything we want or need. On the other hand, our human relationships are often used in our life for good things. Ultimately the thing that makes our relationships great is when we've allowed the creator in the mix, dealing with our hearts in truth and in reality. If and through all your relationships, your ultimate source of rooting is in Christ, I believe you will grow and so will those relationships that are also rooted there!

Our hearts are deceitful even in the best of our relationships.
He helps us keep it real. And that's the tension of trust for me.

'till i only dwell in thee....

Earlier today I was listening to Brooke Fraser sing "Hymn". There's a line in the song that I couldn't stop thinking about.

"...til I only dwell in thee, that I only dwell in thee."

What is she really singing about? A dwelling is a place you reside. It's a place that you're settled, where you're content to let your hair down and live a little. Another meaning of the word is to dwell on something and that's to think about something at length and to become preoccupied with it.

What I get from this song and especially the chorus is that life takes us many places. And in all the places this life takes us, there are a lot of things to turn to, a lot of things to find comfort in, to become preoccupied with. Yet until I only find that deep settling and contentment in my relationship with Christ, I'll keep coming around the same corner looking for something more.....

"til I only dwell in thee, that I only dwell in thee."

I think it's a daily thing to learn that ultimately only when He's at the center of my life am I going to be satisfied. You can have the best of the best but it will never fully quench those thirsts that lie at the deepest core of the being and can only be saturated by God. He fills the gaps and we are fully satisfied.

The point is that my entire purpose in life is to realize that ultimately, with everything in life -- every season, every challenge, every joy, every pain -- there is really only one thing to do.....in everything that happens....

'til I only dwell in thee.

Fear

This morning I read something I've read tons of times before.
"He delivered me from all my fears!"

I can easily count the many times throughout my life I've faced some sense of fear about a variety of things. When it comes to adventure and trying new things, that is rarely the source of my fears. It's often internal dialogue that feeds on my personal insecurities, doubts or questions. What I'm so thankful for about in this walk with Christ is that I can also count the many time He has delivered me from each and every fear. Sometimes its a process, and sometimes it just disappears completely.

I wonder if fear takes something that might have a little bit of truth to it and mixes it with lies, insecurities, doubts and all the negative things your brain naturally gravitates to and trys to start a bonfire on that. What I find usually happens is the very things I fear are smokescreens for some really good things that are just around the corner. I find that when I put my fears on the table before God and give Him all my thoughts, some amazing breakthroughs happen in faith and in life.

Fear is a smokescreen. Don't be blinded by it.

Chloe's overnight list :)

Until Noel and Mo officially relocate to Washington, I've hunkered down in Sparks and am living with Noel and the kids while Mo finishes up their house in the green state.

Yesterday I noticed on the fridge that my niece had put together a list of 21 things she can do with her little friend Millicent who is going to spend the night one of these Friday nights before she moves.

Oh to be back in the world of pre-teen. Do you remember these days? Here's the list of 21 I wanted to share with you. I smiled so big....I specifically smiled at the innocence of most 9 year olds doing #7 or #21. Hilarious!!

TO DO LIST WITH MILLICENT ON FRIDAY IN THE DAY

1. Go on the computer
2. Makeover
3. Play house
4. Dress up
5. Do eachothers hair
6. Tricks with the dog
7. Talk about boys
8. Play outside
9. Drink out of bowls (with straws)
10. Play princesses
11. Dance to Don and Tailor (hip hop)
12. Lemonade stand (if we can)
13. Pillow fight
14. Marco polo
15. Hide and seek
16. Tag outside
17. Meet my family
18. Clean mess (if there is)
19. Draw pictures to each other
20. Watch a chick flick
21. First one asleep pours hot water on their head or put bra in freezer

Photography, Trees, Cool, Crisp Air & A Breeze

Last Wednesday Debi and I went to an REI workshop on capturing Fall colors. There were a few photographic techniques that I learned and that was a lot of fun. We are planning to use our new skilz at Rancho San Rafael park or some other trail head soon. This brings me to a desire for a better camera. I'm thankful for the camera I have on the I-phone, but don't really have a lot of flexibility with it....zoom, lense options, etc., are lacking. Oh well. I'll enjoy what I've got and be content in it.

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There's something about trees that I'm fascinated with. The tree outside of Noel and Mo's house is so intriguing. I'm going to take a picture and try and sketch it sometime. Maybe it's the thought that below the surface of the earth there are roots shooting in various directions to keep that tree grounded and sturdy. Maybe it's the fascination I have with the variety of bark found on different trees. The leaves shapes are also quite intriguing for me. I think of all the scriptures referencing a tree....most specifically being rooted in Christ and being like that tree that's planted beside streams of living water....flourishing throughout life. I want to be a tree....Not literally, but in my spiritual walk. What started as a seed 21 years ago, I pray germinates into a full grown tree that others can climb, or build a nest in it.

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One of the best things about Nevada is the cool, crisp morning air. I love breathing in that wonderful Nevada air. One of the best things about this state. :)

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I'm hoping to get a painting easel and some new painting supplies very soon. I've got the itch to paint some themes. I'd love to take painting classes so I'm keeping my eyes open for something that would work with my schedule.

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Once again I'm thankful for all the blessings God has given me. I'm trusting Him to lead, guide and direct me in my relationships, my job, my hobbies, my life. He makes all things work together for good. And for that, I'm so absolutely blessed :)