true love

A Maundy Thursday Prayer

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I copied this from another blog because it spoke so deeply to me on this Maundy Thursday. Here is a prayer from Henri Nouwen:

“I am looking to you, Lord. You have said so many loving words. Your heart has spoken so clearly. Now you want to show me even more clearly how much you love me. Knowing that your Father has put everything in your hands, that you have come from God and are returning to God, you remove your outer garments and, taking a towel, you wrap it around your waist, pour water into a basin and begin to wash my feet, and then wipe them with the towel you are wearing …

You look at me with utter tenderness, saying, ‘I want you to be with me. I want you to have a full share in my life. I want you to belong to me as much as I belong to my Father. I want to wash you completely clean so that you and I can be one and so that you can do to others what I have done to you.’

I am looking at you again, Lord. You stand up and invite me to the table. As we are eating, you take bread, say the blessing, break the bread, and give it to me. ‘Take and eat,’ you say, ‘this is my body given for you.’ Then you take a cup, and, after giving thanks, you hand it to me, saying, ‘This is my blood, the blood of the new covenant poured out for you.’ Knowing that your hour has come to pass from this world to your Father and having loved me, you now love me to the end. You give me everything that you have and are. You pour out for me your very self. All the love that you carry for me in your heart now becomes manifest. You wash my feet and then give me your own body and blood as food and drink” (Henri Nouwen).

Maundy Thursday is the best example of true love. It’s love that is expressed not just in kind words and poetic sentiments but is lived out in sacrificial deeds. It is the supreme selfless love that goes out to people undeserving and often unwilling to receive such love.

May that kind of love fully dwell within our hearts so that we can in turn show love in the breaking of bread and washing of feet and selfless service with those with whom we live and work and play.

 

Maybe My Favorite Line From a Song Ever

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u2

“I can feel your love teaching me how
Your love is teaching me how to kneel, kneel” (U2, from the song Vertigo).

I discovered this line today. It’s odd that after listening to a song hundreds of times that one particular line that you’ve missed can suddenly catch your attention. This was Tthe line from the song Vertigo from the U2 album How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb.

This line makes a lot more sense if you see it as God’s love rather than human love. I can say from my own personal experience that the love of God has taught me to kneel, not just as a posture, but as an action reflecting an attitude adjustment in my own heart.

True love of any kind is ultimately about surrender. It’s not what I want but what you want that matters, especially when it comes to the love of God. True love says, “Not my will but Thine,” which is a lot easier to pray as a line from a rote prayer than as an actual declaration.

Only those who have experienced God’s love can truly surrender their wills and lives. Not those who have read about or know facts about God’s love but those who have seen and felt and touched and been transformed by it.

So, yes, God’s love is still teaching me to kneel. To let go of my own desires so I can receive God’s much grander and wilder desires for me. To let my own plans and dreams crumble into dust so that my life can be a blank slate where God can dream His dreams for me and in me.

I say all this like I’m actually good at it, but I’m not. I’m much too stubborn and I cling to my will far too often for my own good. But thankfully God is far more patient with me than I am with God (or with me for that matter).

I’m learning how to kneel.

 

Trusting in True Love

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charliebrownisokay

“But for my part I trust in thy true love.
My heart shall rejoice, for thou hast set me free.
I will sing to the Lord, who has granted all my desire” (Psalm 13:5-6).

That’s where I am, folks. My life hasn’t turned out like I thought it would, and that truly is okay. It only means something better’s coming.

I still believe that with all my being. I still believe that God has taken me by a unique path because He has unique blessings in store for me.

Maybe that’s you. Maybe your life hasn’t turned out nearly to be what you’d thought it be at this point. Maybe you haven’t hit those all-important societal markers that tell you that you’ve arrived.

Maybe you don’t have kids. Maybe you’re not married. Maybe you’re (gasp) still living with mom and dad, It’s easy to feel like you’re the world’s biggest failure.

But maybe, just maybe, that’s where God has you for a reason. Maybe, just maybe, you’ve got something special coming and you’re just not ready to receive what God has in store for you right now.

I know that the Bible is replete with stories of people who had to wait for their promise from God. Joseph, Moses, Abraham, and David are just a few out of many. So if you’re waiting, you’re in good company.

The point is that what God has promised to you is truer than your present circumstances. In fact, He is so true to His word that whatever He’s promised is as good as done and you can truthfully say right now that God has “granted all my desire.”

That’s not an easy place to be, waiting on God’s promises. Waiting is never easy. But it is a good place. And always, always worth it.

 

 

 

And now for something completely different. . . and random . . .

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Greekfest2013

Here are some thoughts I had on the way home from the Greek Festival.

1) As I was watching the Greek dancing, a little voice in my head said, “You don’t learn to dance by watching other people dance. You learn to dance by dancing.” And every dance starts with taking that dreaded first step. You don’t learn to live by watching other people live; you learn to live by living– taking risks, learning from failure, and laughing at yourself. You don’t learn faith by reading about it or studying the meanings of the various words used for faith in the Bible, you learn by trusting (or “faith”-ing”) God. By a moment by moment declaration of surrender and trust in God.

2) As my favorite philosopher, Ferris Beuller, said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop every once in a while and look around, you could miss it.” If you are all about living life and warp speed, you miss all the little things that make life worth living. Take time to smell a rose or watch a mother play with her newborn or marvel at a sunrise or breath in the night air. Wherever you are, just be in the moment. Just be. Find a quiet secluded spot and listen for that Still Small Voice that spoke worlds into existence.

3) I’m borrowing this from a friend. The next time you are tempted to get aggrevated or irritated at something or someone, ask yourself one question (not “Do ya feel lucky, punk?”). Ask, “Is this something that Jesus died for?” Did Jesus die to make traffic move more smoothly, or to make the office copier operate jam-free, or to make all people nicer? Then why do those things make me angry. No, wait. They don’t make me angry. Nothing can make me do anything, but I choose to be angry. And I can choose not to be. Jesus died not for the deserving, but for the very undeserving, of which I am one. If I want to be like Jesus, I need to show grace toward the people that cut me off in traffic, the copiers that won’t copy, and the meanies of the world.

4) Remember that no matter how hard it is to love someone who has hurt you or let you down, God showed that such love is possible. True love will never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never give up on anyone at any time, because God never, never, never, never. . . .etc. . . . gave up on us. True love, or agape love, is impossible, but I have learned that God is really good at making the impossibles into possibilities. So love each other like your life depended on it. Love like you want to be love. Love like God has loved you. Let God love you and love through you.

As always, I believe. Help my unbelief. Make me a vessel through which You can pour out love to a world desperately in need of it. My life, whether I live one more day, or 100 more years, is in Your hands.