Going Deeper

Caution! You are about to enter into deep territory here. Please proceed, I'm just feeling deeply these days. Some days I'm introspective and some days I'm . . . lazy and just don't want to write it all out.

I've been thinking a lot about love these days. About the love I have for my family. About the love I have for my husband. Which by the way grows more and more every day. It's been almost a year since he was diagnosed with cancer and praise God we are walking cancer free! Yea!!!!!!

The experience has opened my eyes and I feel that I finally really understand "don't sweat the small stuff" and the ever popular "It's all small stuff". That took long enough.

I'm not perfect here, mind you, I still behave in patterns that I have always behaved in. But I see it now and that's the beginning. Like when my honey ask me an innocent question and I hear something totally different. That's when I snap and say something defensive and then I look at him for his defensive answer and there I see it, shock. Then I realize I've done it again and say, "you didn't say it the way I heard it did you"?

He loves me, that's all I can say about that and he knows me, so when I react like that he knows, I don't always listen well but I will see it.

Ever since the song that Brandon Heath put out, "Give Me Your Eyes" I have been asking God to open my eyes to see things they way He sees them. I have a heightened sense of awareness, since cancer walked into our lives, of just how much I love living and how much I want to live and love others. Not just live, but live well and not in the world's standard but in God's. And, seeing through spiritual eyes, I see just how far I have to go.

God is faithful to answer prayers and He is showing me the state my heart is in and sometimes I am shocked and sickened by what I see. I am thankful that God is showing me these lightening fast reactions, because they are in my heart and they are the truth before the learned behavior sets in.

They are the thoughts that whisper by in my initial reaction to others who are different from me, different race, different social or economic status, different place in life. They are so strong that I react immediately to them often losing the moment forever to make a positive difference in that person's life - to just show kind eyes toward them. To not have these thoughts that exalt myself over another person. I hate those thoughts!

I'm not really talking about something extraordinary, just make eye contact. I don't like it when I look away to quickly.

It takes knowing they these deeply rooted thoughts are there before I can replace them with God's Word.

Hebrews 4:12, 13 - For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow, it judges the thought and attitudes of the heart. 13. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

Whoa. It's not play time people, it's get right with God time. We never know what tomorrow will bring or even the next minute. Love while there is still time.

My friend Judy, (her grand babies started calling her mama Juju - now we all do), reminds us "that it's God's kindness that leads us to repentance". Romans 2:4 Another friend told me once that "the fruit of rejection is anger" and mama juju alway says, "hurting people hurt people."

1John 4:19, we love because He first loved us. 1Peter 4:8 Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sins. And I can't close with out leaving you with The Message version of 1Peter 4:8 Most of all, love each other as if your life depeneded on it. Love makes up for practically anything.

Sigh, I love love.

See ya.