All We Need is Love

Whirlwind. That's the best word to describe my day today, and pretty much my whole life right now. Does everyone who has four kids feel like they're running a race everyday? It's exhausting, but if I think about it for 1.5 seconds, I know I wouldn't want it any other way. I mean, what fun is a day without laundry, shopping, Christmas gift making, meal planning, chicken cooking, baby nursing, doctor visiting, bottom wiping, phone call making, check book balancing, and a little taxi service? I actually love days when I look back on the craziness and can't believe all that got done between the hours of 7am and 11pm. Of course, there's a list about a mile long of things yet to be done. Oh, well. That's what tomorrow's for, right?

The huge drawback to the craziness of life right now is that lack of intimate, quiet time I get with the Lord. I have been better about stealing away moments to read His Word each day. I have a faithful and relentless prayer partner who calls everyday to start our morning focused on Him. And my life requires a constant stream of desperate prayers lifted up to Him. But I'm lacking in those times when I can be still and hear that still, small voice. If I did get still for two seconds, I'm pretty sure He'd have to talk to me in my dreams anyway. (Sam, if you'd like to sleep for more than two hours at a time tonight, that'd be perfectly fine with me.)

God has shown me something very simple this week, though. I am an over-analyzing, criticizing perfectionist, in case you didn't already know. I tend to make life a little more complicated than it really has to be. Every once in a while, God just has to give me a little wake-up call and remind me what's really important...and it's never clean bathtubs. Go figure.

Through the sermon of a man who it seems must have an incredibly intimate and familiar relationship with his Father and through the book of 1 John (another guy who was pretty tight with God), the Lord has reminded me of the simplicity of what He wants from me. To love others. Profound, I know. But we are so hard on each other. We talk endlessly of what others have done to annoy us, hurt us, or anger us. We dwell on the mistakes of others, unwilling to let go and move past it. We point out the faults of others and share with anyone who will listen how we could have done things better than old so-and-so. We think we know best and everyone else should just consult us before every breath they take. If only everyone would act the way we know they should.

But if we just took the time to step back and look at others through an objective lens instead of through the clouded lens of our own feelings, expectations, and agendas, we'd find a person who is struggling to get through another day. A person who is faulted, but not nearly as faulted as we are. A person who could use a hug. A person who just needs to see a smiling face and know that someone cares, no matter what stupid things they've done or said that day. A person who just wants to be loved. Isn't that all of us? We know we're not perfect, and we should accept the fact that none of us will be perfect this side of eternity. If people - or God - only loved me when I was perfect, heaven knows I'd be a pretty lonely, unloved, and desperate soul.

In Genesis, Joseph's brothers were consumed with jealousy and hatred because they had a dad who really messed things up. Daddy Jacob played favorites and his sons just couldn't deal with it. They wanted to hurt their brother, but I think they wanted to hurt their dad a little, too. So, Joseph is taken out of the picture for years, Jacob is beside himself with grief, and the brothers are plagued with guilt and regret. Then we see those same guys many years later, and guess what they're dad is doing. He's still playing favorites. Now it's just Benjamin instead of Joseph, but Daddy is still consumed with only one of his 12 sons. He hasn't changed, but the other ten brothers sure have. We see them looking out for the good of Benjamin and their dad, despite the fact that Jacob is still that same messed up parent he was so many years before. The sons had changed and just decided to love their dad despite the fact that he was obviously making the same mistakes for years on end. There is such freedom in just deciding to love someone as they are instead of expecting them to change.

I say all this not having mastered it at all in my life, but I thought I'd just share what God is reminding me of in case maybe you could use a little reminder as well. So, just go love on some people and quit expecting them to be perfect. I've got a house full of imperfect, wild people to practice this on...and they have their work cut out for them in trying to love little old me. :)

1 John 4: 7 Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. 8 But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. 10 This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other... 20 If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? 21 And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their Christian brothers and sisters.