Moving on ...

So like today, my Pastor talked about One Prayer; which you need to check out.
So anyway, I love the stories he tells.
This one I had been fortunate enough to hear it before, and it gets better each time I hear it.

My pastor is an evangelist by nature. He's good at it.
He was involved in a group effort (more than 200 people, I think) trying to bring people into the Kingdom on Heaven. I know that phrase sounds so corny, but it's basically talking to individuals about beginning a relationship with Jesus.

However, every group my pastor was in returned with absolutely zero stories about people beginning a relationship with Jesus. Three seperate occasions and nothing. How annoying, fristrating and disheartening. I'd be a little miffed myself; or maybe think about a career change.

Anyway, my pastor went on to say that he went to bed and his wife, Angie stayed awake to pray for him. The next day she told him what God had laid on her heart to share with him about why his efforts were showing no fruit.

Angie shared with him that although Byron had a passion for bringing people into a relationship with Jesus, he did not love them. He was good at evangalizing people; not good at seeing them as people who just needed to be shown a little love.
and thank God she shared that with him, because it burned a desire in him to grow a hear to love others and eventually to begin and church which does just that! C3 baby! Check it out!

Wow.

Ya know, God sent Jesus, his only son, to this world because he loved us and wants to have a relationship with us. Jesus died a painful death, God, the father watched; allowed it to happen; allowed others to mock and spit and kill his only son; that's how much he wants to be with us.

Sounds rather morbid, don't ya think; but really it is the greatest love of all. Jesus sacrificed himself and died. He volunteered.

Why don't I love that much?
Heck, I can't even stand to be in the same room with some people because of the past injuries I have endured. Yet, I say I love them.

Yeah right. How is that communicating love?
It isn't.
It's commnicating a contingency plan.
If they do things my way, I will love them.
That's also called BS.

I can't say I love someone if I can't even stand to be near them.
It's a matter of handing it over to God, trusting him fisrt.
After all, did he not have his son die in order to reconcile a broken relationship.
Yes, he did.
So, why would he not want to reconcile my relationships?
I don't have an answer for that.
All I can say is that it is something I have to trust God about.
Sometimes I want it to fix it right away and I am not patient enough.
Sometimes, when I takes to long, I take the initiative; and other times, when he doesn't answer me, I just continue with the same behavior. And still again I sometimes don't want an answer, because I am afraid of what that answere might be.

Love is a choice; it is not a feeling, it is not an emotion.
It is an active choice.

Love (I Corinthians 13)
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.