hitch and Jesus .

' this right here is what makes falling in love so hard ' love doctor Hitch . [[ edited for reader appreciation ]]

further edit . . . ' what makes love so hard '

what if loving someone , not just in a couple relationship but the context of any relationship , is so hard because we've got love all wrong ??

in my humble opinion this is actually not really an if question or a question at all . what i mean by what if is . . .

this is why love is so hard .
we don't have a gosh darn clue what love is and we're going about all the wrong ways to figure it out . we don't even need to figure it out . it's been laid out for us . it's been lived for us .

we've robbed love of what it is and made it shallow .
we've made it insignificant .
we've made it meaningless .
we've made it disposable because we want it to be easy .

but what ' we've made it ' doesn't change what it actually is , as much as we would like to think and make believe other wise .

a couple of weeks ago , before my blog was up , i wrote a post about forgiveness - or lack there of - in my own life  [[ you can find it here . .  it will also help the picture make sense ]] .

as with anything , The Lord asks us to do our part that we by doing so may allow Him to do His . He is omnipotent but He will never force His power on us against our will and our obedience is not a burden to offer but the acceptance of an invitation into deeper intimacy and freedom ; to have heavy weight lifted off of our shoulders and fresh air breathed into our lungs . i am learning and living it every day . so many instances of needing to forgive where i've chosen to say it while doubting my heart on believing if i meant it .

my part was to say it . His part was to move in me to mean it . to teach me what saying it meant . i didn't think i meant it , because i didn't feel it .
but forgiveness isn't a feeling .
likewise , either is love .


think about it .

what did both love and forgiveness feel like to Jesus ?
it felt like being beaten and broken left bleeding and dying as He hung by ripping flesh penetrated with nails ; skin grating against harsh and splintered wood .

yet He chose . 

The Word tells us that our sin grieves Him .
we have the capacity to break His heart , we betray Him , reject Him , and we do it repeatedly .

and yet . . He chose.

to love a person is not to love their actions , their choices , their words , or their grievances against us . it is not to enter in to relationship with every one of them or feel rainbows and butterflies, leaping for joy at the sight or thought of them .

it is to validate the pain they caused , healthily protect ourselves from future offenses from them , all the while seeing them as Jesus sees you ::

valuable .
worthy .
cherished .
irreplaceable .
His .
on purpose .
with purpose .
redeemable .
forgiven .

you see i think we look at the people we don't like or who have hurt us like they suddenly are in our possession . they hurt us and so we suddenly have this special connection and association to them with our hurt and our pain . suddenly we dont' need Jesus in that relationship anymore. they hurt us and so He becomes [ albeit subconciously . .  ] irrelevant .
forgiveness . . love . . becomes about them and about us .

but it's not about that at all .
i think of who i need to love and forgive . i see their face , feel what i feel , and stop there .

wrong .

i need to practice thinking of who i need to love and forgive . look up to Jesus and see His face ; look into His eyes and surrender .
it is there that than by experiencing first hand all over again real love my perspective changes and my heart is softened .

it is there that what consumes me is made right again . .

or rather , Who .

worship whimsy & wild .

people have , often in my life , told me that i am brave .

i have always , for the most part quietly , disagreed .

" i'm only brave because i have to be "

name that movie ? anyone ? caroline ? that's my sister . . we play this game a lot. for future reference ? mulan is usually a pretty safe bet . . i would , of course , start with an exception .

it's the lion king . pretend you knew , even if you didn't .

anyways .

i've been faced with plenty of reason to be forcedly brave , although , i suppose i didn't have to be but they are those kinds of situations where the option isn't really an option , you know ?

to be brutally honest , i think that sometimes - most of the time - every time ? - feigning bravery sounded worse than fear and i believed i deserved the worst , so bravery it was .

as there are exceptions with the movie game , there are a select few instances i'll take the silver star . . it is silver . gallant . i googled it .

i've always been a sucker for the comparison game though so on second thought , (or are we at third . . fifth . . seventh ?) , if you were to hold the "actually" brave up against the "faking it" brave . . they wouldn't seem too consequential in my opinion and would lose all their merit . disqualified . back to square one .

can you tell i carry an impressively dominant indecissive gene ? i was born without any dna for balance . . and a few other things . . so Indecisive was kind enough to spread itself out and make itself comfortable to make up for what was missing .

my mom also says i'm an introvert . . an 'outgoing introvert' . . but i have this theory . i think my brother would agree that i'm actually (at least) 2 different people . . but not in the clinically diagnosable sense . . my external self is an introvert . all up inside of me though ? extrovert . all the way . we're in our first post and it's already ringing true to you too . . i am an extremely internal extrovert all bound and wound up within my own self .  the 'outgoing introvert' is where the two intermingle .

nailed it . it's exhausting .

i'm exhausting . i'm aware .

bare with me .

it's fine .

anyways (did i already say that once ? wrap it up here girlfriend . . okay. yes. we've got this . . did i just say 'we?!')

the point is.  i am about to brave . because i want to be . and because i'm worth it .

it turns out that all of those times i 'punished' myself faking it ? when the choices were

' 1. take my own life or

2. suffer through it at the hands of others . . choose the most miserable option . ' and i was convinced that option was 2 ??

i was wrong . so very . very . wrong .

if there were stars for hating yourself , i would have earned them all .

it turns out 1. would have been the worst option all along .

if you're one of those who have a hard time admitting your wrong , try that one on for size . (but don't actually , just take my word for it) it becomes a whole lot easier to admit you're wrong when you realize being right would have left you dead about 97 times over .

the point is , i have not been brave . i have been afraid but all along there has been Someone loving me greater than i hated myself and my fear of other people .

He has not let me ruin my own life. i tried . i got tired of it .

He can sustain Himself much longer than i can so rather than resist Him i started going with Him .

i'm headed into an adventure and i'd like you to come with me .

in two weeks i will be packing up my car , loading up a uhaul , and headed to waco , texas to attend Antioch Community Church Discipleship School .

i have hopes and dreams , visions and promises covering the next year . i have spent far too much of my life in hiding , enslaved to one of secrecy and lies , but i've come to the light and found The One whom my Soul loves ( Sol. 3:4 ) and His glory begs , even demands , to be seen .

this is my year . this is Our year .

a beginning that has no end .

this is life .

it is worship . .

    it is whimsy . .

         
        and it is wild .