I am not, by nature, a loving person. I wish I could say I was, but I am not and I don't think I ever will be. By nature that is. But when I am in God and He in me, I just love to love people. My pastor recently spoke at Salt Company and stated, "Loved people love people." True as can be.
The ironic thing about this is that while I was preparing myself to draft this post on loving others, I quite unexpectedly found myself being challenged (legitimately challenged) to love an other person. It was rather humbling and I found myself quite stunned with a million unloving things running through my head and I had half a mind to speak them out loud. By God's grace (seriously a miracle) I kept mouth shut and literally went to my computer and googled "Loving others well" and watched a sermon, which did my heart a world of good.
It's a wonder to me, with all the tragedy that has happened lately such as the Boston bombings and shooting sprees lately, that so many people question why people do hurtful things. I feel like people should be more questioning when someone does something loving, after all, being selfless is not all that common in today's culture.
But it's not just loving the difficult people out there that seems to be such a challenge to us, it seems to me that there exists a great problem in loving outside of our circle. And, as one who leads a small group and has over a dozen young women to seek after and love as part of my daily life assignment, I understand how overwhelming it can be to even think of trying to love beyond what I've already been given as my set of people to love. But here's my thinking, if I am truly loving my girls well, then they shall feel loved. And if they are feeling loved, then, hopefully, they are able to love each other well. And if they are loving each other well, then hopefully I will see them love outside of our connection group. I have seen this. And I know it's not because of any love I have poured into them, what ever love the feel from me is from God, and what ever love I see them use beyond the wonderful circle of our Bible study is also from God.
Point being, it should be a ripple affect. God's love dropped on your life should cause love to ripple out to the people around you. And that ripple should reach the people around them, and so on and so forth.
But, what I've been finding is, there is this great tragic thing happening even in the midst of such a wonderful ministry as the one in which I am involved.
People are sitting alone. And feeling alone. :(
I am quite an insecure person myself and being alone is by far my biggest fear/insecurity. I think, because I spent a lot of time feeling alone before I knew the love of Christ. As it is, I still have a great fear of walking into a room full of people and not having someone to talk to or sit by or spend time with. I even picked where I went to college based on the fact that my sister was already here and I wouldn't have to be alone. So I think the Lord has just placed it in my heart to reach out to people that I see alone simply because I can empathize easily.
If I'm being totally honest, though, I'm not as brave as I might seem when it comes to speaking with strangers. God is just really funny, though, as He has often placed it on my heart to go sit by a stranger or invite them to join me in something because it makes my heart pound a little every time. But the Lord desires an obedient heart and so I've been trying to be more so, especially in that way.
A couple weeks ago I was on my way to go sit with my friends as our ministry worship time had already begun and I happen to walk past a fellow sitting completely by himself. I think he was the only person in that row, in fact. I stopped and asked if he was sitting with someone and he told me he wasn't. With out even thinking I asked if it was okay if I sat by him and he said it was. And then in my head I began to think, "Ha..I'm an idiot. I'm a girl. It's not my place to reach out to a boy. I don't know what I was thinking." I didn't even know his name. And then during the night's talk I laughed at myself and thought, "Well, I feel a little foolish, buuuut oh well. Not the first time. But I don't know what I was thinking." Okay, so yeah, I didn't really think that one through. But! The Lord used it any how in a lot of ways:
1. That fellow had been coming the whole semester and had been sitting alone every night
2. I, and all those in my friend group, made a new friend that night.
3. My friends and I had been planning a get together since January and the fellow ended up hosting it at his house a week and a half later (because we didn't have a location for our get together).
And other crazy great things came out of that. And it obviously wasn't because of me because I was chiding myself half the time I was sitting by him. But since then, even, I've been made more aware of people who've rather slipped through the cracks some how. Which disturbs me. Of course I'm aware of how I've apparently failed in loving others well, of course I have. But I think that one of the most tragic things in the Christian community is that we sometimes get caught up in compartmentalizing our ministry that we miss the miscellaneous. I know we are not to spread ourselves thin, that is why Christ gave us the body in the first place, but if we decide, "These people and only these people are my ministry" than we have a major problem.
I can remember as a freshman when a friend told me that he was only going to love the dudes in his bible study and not his roommate and not the people on his dorm floor because he was not
"assigned" to them. I was quite shocked at the time and disturbed, too. That is, until the next year came around and I had one difficult roommate after another (three in one year) who took more love than I had to offer and as it was, I just did not love them. They weren't my friends and they weren't in my Bible studies and they weren't international students. And while I could pour myself out in international ministry and pour myself out in Bible study, I could not bring myself to pour anything into my difficult roommates.
That is because I was not seeking God's love for loving others. I could love people who would love back and I could compartmentalize ministry just as well as the next person. I still do, I think, probably.
But if everyone does that, than the church will never grow and people will slip through our fingers like sand before we knew they were ever among us. I think I'm preaching to myself in this, mostly.
I have no particular person in mind who misses the miscellaneous other than myself. I want to be better at loving others, I've decided. I want to be known as a loving person. I want to be known as someone who cares for others. Not because I want to be recognized, but because I want people to be able recognize Jesus. And I am most ashamed that more often than not, I am a poor and dim reflection of the man who has loved and cared for me best.
Really, I just wished I loved others better.
The only way I could possibly accomplish such a desire would be for me to draw from the Living Water that I have access to already. It's not that I don't have the resources, it's more that I don't use it. I don't fill my ja-- I just had an epiphany!
If we are like jars that get cracked and broken and shattered and remade and it always seems as though we are full of holes and totally not in a place for God to use us, we're probably in a perfect place for God to use us. Beeecause... A jar full of holes can't contain water. Meaning it's seeping out all over the place. Meaning a jar full of holes waters the flowers best. Yeah?
Okay, anyways, so loving others well. Heh, Jesus knew what he was doing when he met the Samaritan woman by a well. He was loving well as a loving well. That's why He said He had living water. Jesus was all about the object lessons, which I love because I'm a visual learner to the max. He sat on that well and was like, "Hey, know what me and this well have in common?" He tends to meet us where we're at, I guess. I could just as easily see him coming up to us in modern times as we stop at the water fountain between classes to fill our CamelBaks and saying, "Hey, know what me and this water fountain have in common?" And probably, He is there. We just choose not to see Him, or hear Him. But He's probs watching us fill our water bottles and saying, "Hey, know what you and this water fountain should have in common?"
And like I said, I'm preaching to myself mostly. I just hope I practice what I preach.
Beautiful post. I think you were preaching to me too.
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