I
have had a lot of anxieties lately.
There
are a few battles going on inside of me that I really have not wanted to be
honest about.
So –
I have done what any self-righteous human being would have done…I ran…
Or
at least, I tried to.
You
know when you have been really hurt by something and it takes awhile to heal
from it? Well…it has been QUITE a while…and I was doing really well – so
naturally, I had come to the conclusion that the appropriate amount of
“healing” time had passed…and I was free from any further pain or negativity
that this particular thing had to offer…
Dumb.
The
other day my devotional was about “burning bridges” to our past – the ones that
keep us from loving and keep us held down in bitterness and ultimately…keep us
useless to God.
Great!
“burning bridges…” I can do that! In fact – I would LOVE to do that!!! I’ll
douse those things completely in gasoline, take a blowtorch to ‘em and watch
‘em burn completely…and abruptly…to the ground! I won’t ever have to worry
about them again!!! Whatever they connected me to will soon be lost and
forgotten and I will finally be rid of all of it!!!
Best.
Plan.
Ever.
When
can I start?
So
loving I am…
So
eager to [lovingly] “burn bridges” to my past…
So
full of virtue.
So.
Dumb.
It
only took me about………three weeks to realize that my problem is not whatever
those “bridges” connect me to…but my problem is my heart concerning the issues.
I am
so thankful that God’s love for me is not contingent upon my level of
“loveableness.” (yes, that is a word)
PRAISE
GOD that it is just His NATURE to LOVE ME!!
It
is not something He has to ever force, or ever spend a few days, or weeks, or
months, reconsidering or contemplating…but He just loves me because…it is just
Him.
That’s
the easy part…
“…love
one another as I have loved you.” – John 15:12
What?
“…love
one another as I have loved you.”
Okay!
But just the people that I really get along with and like right?
“…love
one another as I have loved YOU.”
Alright…but
not the people who have ever hurt or betrayed me, yeah?
“…love
one another as I have loved YOU.”
Okay…….but
not the crazy people….like the murderers and criminals?
“…love
one another as I have loved YOU.”
No
matter how I try to look at it…I could easily be considered as one of the worst
of the worst.
Not
because I have killed someone…or because I have ever committed some atrocious
crime against another human…
But
because I know HIS commands…and I ignore them.
“…love
one another as I have loved YOU.”
“Greater
love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.” (v.
13)
For
my friends…hopefully in a heartbeat…but for those whom I don’t always consider
friends? What about them?
I
guess it comes down to why I would ever consider someone to not be my
friend.
I
could give you a thousand reasons why this person or that person is not my
friend.
But,
if He were asked, how many reasons would Christ be able to give for why it
doesn’t make sense that HE CALLS ME friend.
Not
only that…but what He did in order to make a way for me to come to Him, before
I even knew Him… “while [I was] still a sinner…”
So………bridges…
Can
we just drain the river and maybe crawl under them from time to time…?
Would
that be love?
Sure…if
I consider taking the petty mans way out of things to be love…
TRUE
LOVE is “spontaneous, but it has to be maintained through discipline…”
So
“random acts of kindness” (or tolerance, in my case) every now and then to try
to prove to myself (and others) that I am “totes” fine is not satisfactory…?
“The
Lord is…longsuffering toward us…” (2 Peter 3:9)
That’s
how He loves me…
He
is longsuffering towards me…
He
fights for me and works with me and smacks me in the face over and over again
until I get it right.
And
because His love for me is longsuffering…then my love for others should be
longsuffering as well.
Longsuffering
in the sense that…yes, I have been deeply hurt by this…several times…but I have
deeply hurt Christ…several million times…yet He loves me and continually drives
me to what is best.
So
here I am. I am trying. I am disciplining myself each day…each and every day…to
be longsuffering towards it and continue to love. Because no matter how many
ways I hurt Christ, my offenses towards Him are not held against me. So
whatever has been done to me – it doesn’t matter. None of it matters.
I
think, too many times, I foolishly try to tell God how it is – instead of
allowing Him to do what HE wants in my life…
I
don’t know how long this is going to take…everything in my mind says I am
completely ready to be over it all…
Praise
God that He is GOD and He cannot be anything but GOD.
If
“burning my bridges” is going to take away an essential lesson that God has for
me and an opportunity for growth, then please, leave the bridge alone.
Take
about 20 steps back, surround the thing with caution tape, and place
guards at both ends…armed guards…
No
matter how anxious it makes me…or how much hurt it brings up…I don’t
ever want to bypass or miss out on something that God wants to teach me.
Maybe
it’s not about “burning bridges”…maybe it’s about transforming them from bonds
to bitterness into resources of love.
Maybe
tomorrow I will wake up and all of these struggles will just be what I thought
they were for so long… “in the past”…
Or
maybe I will find these trials to be even more burdensome in the morning…
Who
knows, besides God?
I
don’t…and I don’t need to…
All
I care to continually remember is that; “In the multitude of my anxieties
within me, YOUR comforts delight my soul.” (Psalm 94:19)
