Another One of those Random Blogs about Nothing and Everything

This is day two of my first (and hopefully only) bout with pneumonia. To be more accurate, this is the second day since I was diagnosed with pneumonia. It still seems surreal to think about. I’m almost positive that I did my best Don Knotts look of surprise when the doctor told me what I had.

I still don’t feel horrible. I feel decent. I just don’t have an overabundance of energy (and whatever I have ebbs quickly). If I have to be sick periodically, I’d rather it be like this where I can still marginally participate in life and do stuff.

Also, I think it’s easier to be sick in either the fall or spring than in the middle of summer. All that ridiculous heat and excessive humidity don’t help with the whole low-energy, fatigued situation.

I’m thankful for drugs. Especially the drugs that keep you from having to go to the hospital where they charge you one arm, one leg, one kidney, and one first born. Health care has officially spiraled out of control.

I’m thankful for perpetually sleepy 16- (going on 17) year old cats who give the best therapy by curling up in your lap and promptly falling asleep. I believe that may have more of a healing effect than any drug.

I’m thankful for good music that still has the power to transcend the immediate pitfalls and trials of life and transports me back to a seemingly easier and better time. Today’s soundtrack was provided by Steely Dan.

I’m thankful that while I may have more difficultly sleeping lately, my God never sleeps nor slumbers while I’m under His care. There’s not a night that goes by where He doesn’t see me and know where I am and who I am. There will never be a place where He can’t find me to rescue and heal and save me.

As that old guy from Monty Python and the Holy Grail said, “I’m feeling better!”

 

Love on a Tuesday Night

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Mike Glenn spoke about love tonight at Kairos.

No, it was not another sermon on dating or marriage or romantic love. It was about loving Jesus and what that looks like.

It looks like obedience.

As unpopular a term as that may be, obedience defines my love for Jesus. In other words, if I love Jesus, I do what He says. If I don’t do what He says, I don’t love Him, no matter how many warm and fuzzy feelings I get in a worship setting or how well I talk of Jesus or even how much I know about Him.

If I love Jesus, I will do what He says. I will obey Him. Not only when it’s easy or convenient or rewarding.

I think the gauge for my level of obedience is to ask those around me who know me best. Ask them if I really live out what I say I believe. Ask them if I look and act like Jesus on a daily basis.

I do know I fail to be grateful for being so blessed. I have so many people in my life who show me exactly what loving Jesus looks like in lifestyles that model obedience and faithfulness. I have so many people who love me with the love of Jesus and forgive me with a forgiveness that can only come from Jesus.

I don’t have to feed 5,000. I just have to give a cup of cold water to one. I don’t have to build a hospital in Kenya. I just have to visit one sick person or provide something to wear for one person in need. I just have to be faithful today, in this moment, to what I know Jesus is calling me to do and to be.

I don’t ever have any excuse to be disobedient to Jesus. No matter how my obedience is received, no matter how people disdain my efforts, no matter if anyone notices, I still am called to not only hear the words of Jesus, but DO them. To put them into practice. To live them out.

Like every fallible human saved by grace, I could do a lot better. But I’m thankful that ultimately the love that counts most isn’t my love for Jesus, but His unfailing love for me.