More Thoughts...

I'm still reading Blue Like Jazz. I'm really enjoying it, yet at the same time trying to read it and think about what Miller is saying. I tend to take what people say as truth and I am learning to be more questioning, if that's what you can call it.

As I've been reading I've been finding portions that really strike me. I really have appreciated Don Miller's writing style as it is very personal - and funny! I read some parts out loud to Michael and he really like it. Guess who is reading the book now? Yes, I have to "steal" the book back each time I want to read it because it seems to have found its way to Michael's night stand quite a bit!

While reading one specific portion I thought back to my teenage years. I got involved with YWAM's Kings Kids and I went on summer mission trips to different parts of Spain on two different occasions. On the first trip we went up to northern Spain, the Galicia area. Our leaders were talking about God's love. Helping us understand God's love before we hit the streets and shared it with others. I just remember being hit by the reality of God's love one morning in our meeting time. I feel as if it was one of those moments in my spiritual journey which I will never forget. I FELT God's love like never before. I cried. I thought. I felt like I could understand it a little more even though I know I will never completely understand God's love until I see Him face to face.

This memory came back to me as I read this:

"I will obey God because I love God. But if I cannot accept God's love, I cannot love Him in return, and I cannot obey Him. Self-discipline will never make us feel righteous or clean; accepting God's love will....If we hear, in our inner ear, a voice saying we are failures, we are losers, we will never amount to anything, this is the voice of Satan trying to convince the bride that the groom does not love her. This is not the voice of God. God woos us with kindness, He changes our character with the passion of His love."

Oh how many times I have felt discouraged. Felt like I am nothing. Felt like there is no point to what I do. I will cling to Jesus in those moments, knowing that His perfect love makes us whole, makes us have meaning in life.


As I was typing this, I looked up. I have these up on my wall in a frame. Ephesians chapter 3 says:

"And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God."

May you and I experience God's wide, long, high and deep love for us today. A love that gives us meaning and purpose.