Living for Love

     Wanted. Loved. Noticed. Appreciated. Valued. Women and men alike all have a desire to be recognized, sought after, and loved. So many times I have depreciated myself in an attempt to gain attention from my peers, and so many times I have been left empty, hurt, and depressed. And if we’re honest, we all feel like no one loves us at some point; it’s human nature! However, when we enter into the “woe is me” mentality, we begin to obsess and over think our problems, and we lose sight of our blessings, our purpose, and of Love, Himself.

      Trust me when I say that right now I’m speaking to myself also. I still try to gain attention, not by showing off too much skin like many teenage girls do, but by talking constantly and acting slightly ditzy. When you talk constantly everyone notices you, but you barely think about what you’re saying, so you’re bound to say something completely stupid at least five times a day. And when you act ditzy, then you get to be at the butt end of jokes and teasing, which means you’re still getting attention, which isn’t bad, right? Wrong. Sometimes I think that I’d rather be joked about and receive that negative acknowledgement than not be noticed at all. I sound so messed up, demented even; who would choose to be degraded like that? Truth is, often times my desire to be loved is so great, I’ll take both teasing and compliments without question.

     Lately, there has been a specific person I’ve been trying to gain attention and approval from- isn’t there always someone we’re trying to impress, maybe even subconsciously? At one point I received constant affirmation that I was loved, beautiful, worthy, talented, and even that I was a blessing. I began to expect those verifications that made me feel so valued. All of a sudden those reassuring words came to a screeching halt and all attention seemed to stop. I became paranoid that I had done something wrong to deserve this ‘lack of love’, and I became desperate to regain this person’s attention, self-conscious about my appearance, and even questioned my worth; I just wanted to feel loved again.

     Even after all the time I've spent running after love and recognition from someone else, my heart has been in the wrong place the entire time. I was running after a worldly kind of love, the selfish and conditional kind. I was basing my self-worth on whether I had been told that I was beautiful, loved, talented, worthy, when really, after all is said and done, receiving approval from a human’s mouth, or even from a human heart, will have no eternal value. I’m not saying that any type of love expressed by a human will be selfish, but rather that the only true love expressed by humans comes through from an incomprehensible source. The Bible says in 1 John 4:8, “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.  Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” The only kind of love that can fill- excuse me- overwhelm and annihilate our deep desire to be wanted and loved, is the completely unselfish and unconditional love that comes from God, and yeah you read it right, God is love.

     Dictionary.com’s definition of ‘unconditional’ is, “not limited by conditions; absolute.” Is this not crazy, or what? God love is constant and completely unchanging, so no matter how badly we screw up or stray from Him, He loves us the same all the time; His love is unfailing! In one of my favorite songs, One Thing Remains by Jesus Culture, the lyrics express the kind of love that God displays for us:

“Your love never fails, never gives up

Never runs out on me

Your love never fails, never gives up

Never runs out on me…

On and on and on and on it goes

It overwhelms and satisfies my soul

And I never, ever, have to be afraid

One thing remains.”

     So if God is love, and we desire to be loved, then why don’t we chase after God? And if worldly love is selfish, evasive, and conditional, and if the love that God offers is unconditional and completely unselfish, constant, and unfailing, then why aren't we striving after Love, Himself? Are we all so deceived by Satan, that we forget who we’re really supposed to love?

     I know that I was blinded by my own desire to be loved, and I know that I am not alone in my fault. However, I have started on a journey to seek after Love, by giving up “my time” (it’s in quotes because all time is God’s time) to spend time in His Word and with Him in prayer.  It is incredible just how valued you feel after you devote your time to Him. I challenge you to seek out God, because in order to know or find true love, you must first love God!

A Needle's Eye View

 

A man gets home after a long, stressful day at work, and instead of giving a loving hello to his wife, he proceeds to focus on all the things she has failed to do. He begins, “Where is my blue shirt? I needed it for tomorrow and you didn’t clean it, and who’s watching the TV?” The wife replied, “No one is watching TV.” The husband continues on to say, “Why is the television on when I thought we were trying to save money on the electricity bill, and why are there light’s on in the rooms that no one’s even in?” The wife stares silently at her husband in frustration, and wait for him to stop ranting. Finally, he asks, “What’s wrong?” She replies, “I have been working hard all day to clean this house up for you. I vacuumed, dusted, did dishes, cleaned the kitchen, made beds, took out the trash, and all you noticed when you walked in the door was the negative.”

The husband in this story was so blinded by the negative things in his life that he hadn’t even taken the time to notice all the good that surrounded him. Much like the husband, we, as humans, are often so blinded by the negative in our lives, that we forget to enjoy the many goods and blessings that God bestows upon us.

I notice that, in my own life, it only takes one bad thing, like taking a test I didn’t prepare for or even one harsh word, to completely set me off in the wrong direction. I get frustrated with, overwhelmed by, and hyper focused on, whatever my problem is to the extent where I am oblivious to anything good that God is putting in front of me. I mean honestly, sometimes I get so distracted by the negative in my life that He could be putting my favorite food in front of me, and I probably wouldn’t even notice.

During a conversation with my dear friend about “where we had seen God today”, we got on the topic of change and how narrow minded we can be. He said, “Wanting change isn’t the hard part, wanting to sacrifice for change is… and even though in the big picture they don’t seem like sacrifices, they seem pretty big to us. I guess it’s just because people go around looking at the world, but it’s like they’re only seeing through the eye of a needle.”

Let’s focus in on that last part that says, “seeing through the eye of a needle”.  I feel like oftentimes, when we focus too closely on a problem we blow it out of proportion because we are seeing it through narrowed vision. For example, the other day I couldn’t find my driver’s license, like, anywhere! When I realized that I had lost it I was freaking out and looking anywhere I could have possibly left it (just to let you know, keeping any form of I.D. in your running short’s pocket and then doing cartwheels around on a field at night time, isn’t such a great idea because you’ll probably never get it back). Me, being a teenager and all, my license is my ticket to freedom, and without it I was pretty much back to being stuck at home, which let me tell you, was enough to make me blow this problem out of proportion. What was I going to do? How early did I have to start waking up so that my mom could take me to school? How on earth was I going to get to Church that night? I escalated the problem when, really in the long run, losing my license wasn’t a big deal. Yes, my mom had to drive me to school; however, all I had to do was go to the DMV and get my license replaced.

In Matthew 6:27 it is written, “Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?” One of the best ways to zoom out from our problems is to give thanks to God. I feel like it always helps me to start counting my blessings because it reminds me not to set aside those infinite good things just to focus on the bad. Listing off things that you’re thankful for, in your head or on paper, helps you better see how your problem affects you and how much greater the blessings God has for you are than your problems. For me, simple things like blue skies, friend’s laughter, good hugs, or even just the fact that I woke up again this morning, are things that always show me how blessed I am.

 

In 1 Chronicles 16:8-10 it says, “Give praise to the Lord, proclaim his name; make known among the nations what he has done. Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of all his wonderful acts. Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.”

 

 And in verses 12:28-29 in the book of Hebrews it is written, “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire.”

                Thanking God not only brings us comfort and joy, but it brings God to the forefront in our mind. I challenge you, whenever faced with a problem, instead of saying “Why me?” just say “Thank you.” Give thanks to God, and stop looking through the eye of a needle.

The Problem with "Beautiful"

It is often said that, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Some things, however, are inarguably beautiful, inspiring passion, emotion, and awe; for example, sunrises and sunsets, God’s unconditional love, or even mountains so enormously tall that they are engulfed in the clouds. Some smaller things, like the birth of a child, or the lush green that comes with spring, are beautiful. In a human regard, beauty for some is based on physical attractiveness.

A female’s physical attributes are expected to be enhanced, modified, and changed to live up to society’s standard of perfection. The problem is women are told they need to look perfect, and most, if not all, want to fit the world’s standard of what is ‘beautiful’ because they believe that until they reach that standard, they are undesirable. Until they believe that they have met their goal of perfection, which is unattainable by the way, they feel unworthy of love and attention, and see themselves through comparisons with the people who are seemingly perfect. They think they are too different- too far from worldly guidelines to be loved.

When did different come to mean unattractive, strange, undesirable, unwanted, instead of interesting, compelling, desired, and beautiful? Instead of different being seen as a good thing, many now see being different as a flaw. To me it seems like the world is in utter bewilderment. Now a days, people confuse the word ‘like’ for the word ‘love’,  and ‘beauty’ has come to mean ‘hot’ or ‘sexy’ to many.

Models are considered “beautiful”, yet some are self-revolving, indulgent people who treat others like they are scum. And we all can think of that intimidating high school beauty queen with the ‘perfect’ everything, but whose friends were fake, and her mouth was full of gossip and harsh, selfish, words. Is this what beauty has become? An enticing mirage to hide what really lies underneath? As my dad puts it, “Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly goes down to the bone.” What happened to that true and lovely feeling of passion, emotion, and awe that I described earlier, and is what is truly beautiful being overlooked?

I know I am not the only one who has witnessed someone lusting over another and mistaking what they saw as beautiful when all they really loved was the easy satisfaction. Maybe it’s because I’m young, and I myself want eventually to find that person I can spend the rest of my life with, that my vision maybe skewed, but I feel like the girls who hold themselves to a higher standard than the world holds them to, are sometimes the last ones to have a first date, but the first to find a lasting relationship later on.

The ones who strive to serve Christ with their lives and decisions; those are the girls that, because they’re different, are so much more intimidating because they aren’t as easy to get to. People often go after what is easier to get, so those good Christian girls often feel overlooked, when the truth is their true beauty is the first to be noticed, but because they are so hard to attain, there are so few guys willing to man up to the challenge. Chasing after what is easy instead of what is Godly, happens all the time, and we all do it. But ignoring true beauty for those who are sometimes more visually pleasing but internally dissatisfying, is a perfect example of why we all need to chase what is true and not false, what is less easily attained but has more lasting value. True beauty flows from the inside- it’s time for the world to stop lusting with its eyes, and start loving with its heart.

Why Brokenness is a Blessing

     To many, brokenness is the ultimate shame- the ultimate loss of dignity. Hardly anyone wants to feel weak; scarcely anyone wants to be on their knees burdened with sorrow or pain. However, I long for, and envy those effected by, brokenness. Have you met, (or maybe you are) a person who has endured the hardest things- like coming close to death, fighting disease, losing someone close to them, or destroying themselves with drugs, alcohol, or indulgence in sex- and still come out alive, repenting, but shattered? Those people are my role models because I’ve found from past experience, and from scripture, that a key way to drive your passion for God is to be broken- to be at your weakest point. And what I want more than anything right now is a closer relationship with Christ.

     Why, you may ask, would a God who supposedly loves you let you be broken? The answer can be found in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10,

“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

     I want you to focus, for now, on the part where Jesus says, “My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Christ wants us to be broken because when we are completely shattered, and I’m talking about the I-just-dropped-my-iPhone-and-the-screen-is-so-cracked-it-no-longer-works kind of shattered, that’s when we have to completely rely on God to pick up the pieces because let’s face it, He’s the ultimate apple repair guy. My minister once told me that we are like vessels, lamps of God’s light. And the more cracked, the more broken we are, the more of God’s light shines through us.

 

     Now let’s look at the end of the passage where Paul says, “For when I am weak, then I am strong.” It’s simple, so incredibly straight forward- when we are broken, we have the opportunity to be incredibly strong in Christ. This is really the part of brokenness I most long for. To be honest, I’m so desperate to know Christ more, that I wouldn’t care if my house burned down as long as it brought me closer to Him.

     Matt Chandler said, “The pastor took a red rose, and he smelled it, then he showed how pretty it was, and threw it out into the crowd. He said, ‘Everybody needs to smell this.’ – there were about a thousand of us there almost all of us college and high school- ‘Smell the rose,’ he said. ‘I want you to feel it, I want you to touch it, I want you to feel the texture of it - do it, do it and I’m going to continue to teach.’ … And as the sermon wraps up, he says, ‘Where’s my rose? Where is it- where’s my rose?’ and some kid came up with the rose, and it was completely jacked up and just broken, things are falling off, the petals are torn, and the preacher lifts it up and in his big crescendo, in his big point, he held up that rose and said ‘Now who would want this? Who would want this rose?’ And I remember feeling anger- real, legitimate, I-want-to-hurt-him anger, and it was all I could do not to scream out, ‘JESUS WANTS THE ROSE! THAT’S THE POINT OF THE GOSPEL, that Jesus wants the rose! That God made he who knew no sin to be sin, on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God through Him! That while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us!”

     Do you understand? We are the rose, broken and torn, and without God we would be left to drown in our misery. Yet we have been vouched for! Being broken is a blessing because by being broken, we are given this incredible opportunity to grow closer to the one who died for us. Matthew 5:3 says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” Soon enough, brokenness will affect you, if it hasn’t or isn’t already. Take advantage of being shattered, let God pick up the pieces because what could ever be better than growing closer to Him who created all things?

Choking on the Reality of Being a Christian

Have you ever witnessed someone who is having trouble breathing, or have you felt the pain that comes with your lungs closing up, yourself? At lunch, one of my friends couldn’t breathe- she was having an asthma attack. About every five minutes her lungs would close up and she would sit there with the fear that her lungs may not open up again. However, she is so tough that she didn’t want help, and she thought that she would be ‘ok’. I couldn’t take watching her sit there without being able to draw breath into her body. All ten of the people at the table were just watching her, but if something was going to go wrong, if everything wasn’t going to be ‘ok’, I wasn’t going to be the one who just sat there hoping for the best. So I told the nurse.  I knew my friend would be mad at me for ratting her out; yet, the way I see it, a dead relationship is better than a dead friend.

You may not see the biblical connection to this story, but I saw it when I realized the frightening truth that if I didn’t do something, if the situation had been bad enough, and I had just sat there, my friend could’ve lost her life. It’s like watching someone choke on food; most people are like, “Are you ok?” Does a simple question like that solve the problem? No. If no one around you did anything about the fact that the person choking was in a life threatening situation, then that person would probably die. Hate to be blunt with everyone, but we as Christians can’t just sit here asking, “Are you ok?” to the people who don’t know God. Because just like the person choking, not knowing God puts that person in, not only a life threatening situation, but an eternity threatening situation. Then we as Christians have to do the impossible- take action.

Taking action is incredibly scary! You’re afraid to be judged, and it always is really difficult to tell if you’re doing the right thing. Have you ever noticed that the hardest decisions, the ones the devil is fighting you on, turn out to be the most worthwhile? And that the easy decisions that we make on impulse or without thought to what God wants, have the most damaging, lasting consequences? Out of all of this I think the main reason we struggle with taking action is because we’re afraid of what might change. We love being comfortable and staying inside the box, so to speak. But do we ever stop to think that we already have a place in Heaven and so many people around us still don’t know God?

In James 2:18 we read, “But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.” You don’t get to Heaven because of your deeds, but without them, your faith is worthless. God calls us in the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20) to go out and spread His good news. He gives us the choice to serve Him, so the question is:

Are we going to let our friends choke, or are we going to take action, step out of our comfort zone, and serve Christ?

Life's Race (No exercise involved)

Running. It may be a sport (one I participate in, actually), but running can be applied to something greater than athletic clothes and running shoes. That's right, I'm not talking about the kind of running you do so that you can eat that doughnut later today, I'm talking about the kind of running we do in life.

Here's an analogy to get things up and running (punny, right?). So you’re going to go run a 5k, and you’re so excited! I know, some of you are thinking, ‘Me? Run? Puh-lease. I would rather walk on coals.’ but stick with me here. You start to follow the crowd into position, and the gun goes off, and you start to run. You’re feeling really good in the beginning, which is awesome because you never actually trained for the race. However, you soon start to wear down, and you’re getting really, really tired. Shouldn’t this race be over already? You ask one of the helpers how much farther I have to go and they say, “You’ve already run 5 miles, so you have about 8 miles left to go.”*  That’s when you realize you’ve been running the wrong race THIS ENTIRE TIME.

Think about this! You were running the wrong race the whole time. Life is almost like a race, sometimes we just follow the crowd into position, and start running down the wrong path. Because, unfortunately, we can’t always differentiate between right and wrong, sometimes, we start running a race without even knowing what we have gotten ourselves into. This is important. In life, we run after empty things like money, fame, and attention. We all have a longing that needs to be fulfilled, and we all have a God-sized hole in our hearts. Which, shocker, can only be filled by God!!! Lucky for us, God tells us to run to Him!

Here is what the Bible says about running:

Hebrews 12:1-3

1 Corinthians 9:24-27

Isaiah 40:31

* If you don’t know, a 5k is about 3.1 miles, the 13 miles described above account for the amount of a half marathon.