When love is not fun
Some people think that love is something you have to do perfectly. You can't make mistakes you have to be epic and on top of your game always. It has to feel great and wonderful and when it is hard and you hurt and its no longer fun....days and people have become life sucking energy ...then its time to get out...you just weren't made for this or its just too much....
What I have come to see is that love does not come in perfect circumstances. Often it comes wrapped in turmoil and dirty unlovable packages. When we stick with it, when we see past the outer and take the time to slowly break through the tough hard exterior...There is deep beauty, true love deeper and more unfathonable than we could have thought, known or imagined.
Sticking with friends, staying in a home when its not fun... is not easy. There are times when you don't like those around you...and there are times when you don't like yourself. But when it is the ugliest, the worst...that is when it is about to become the best. Or so a wise and wrinkled old grandpa once told me as he stared lovingly into the fading blue eyes of his wife of 50 plus years and answered the question of how they had stayed together for so many years.
Those friends who have stuck with us the longest... they love us not because we are super amazing and do the best for them all the time; but because they have seen past our crusty exterior and they have seen something in us that has called them to stay. So they stick with us through thick and thin whether we deserve it or not. We are all made to love and the beauty of true love is that it never runs out, it never grows thin...we may think we are made to only love one or two people at a time ...but the truth is that if your love runs out the more you are asked to love...then you aren't truly loving. Chances are you are actually giving in order to get and that is the opposite of love. That place where your love ends, terrifying as it may be, that is the place where God's love finally has the chance to begin. True pure deep Agape love. When we love not out of our own strength but out of the grace of God's love then we truly begin to know how deep and wide and powerful and awesome is God's love. But if we always stay where it is safe and in our control then we will never know the true and expounding freedom of true love.
Living with roommates, living in community makes this vividly clear. There are days when you don't want to love those around you and know you have reached your end and can't keep going. And there are those who choose to quit. But then there are those, and those seasons when you choose to press on to push through to show love...ESPECIALLY, when you don't feel like it. And when you ask God to give you the strength...and you choose to love in the slow and plodding daily routine ...it can be agonizing...but it is as if a dam inside of your sould breaks loose and suddenly you see that if you can love in this season, this person then you can truly do anything. The world stands before you and you can soar.
Then there are seasons when you realize that because you truly love this person...you have to walk away. Those are the most agonizing. Some may call it tough love...I call it ripping out one's heart. Leaving when you want to stay, making a choice that breaks you for the sake of them. I saw it in the face of a mother who had tears streaming down her face after she called the cops on her daughter...knowing her daughter may never understand...never forgive her; but it was the most loving thing she could do. Its messy. Its not easy. Its a fine and blurry line that we walk when it comes to love. Its often like closing your eyes and hanging on tight as you dip up and down on the rollercoaster we call love. There is no perfection...in fact perfection may keep you from ever getting on. The highs are so exquisite you hope they will never end and the lows can dip so deep you'll think you are at your end. But the ride is beyond words amazying, its the only way to truly live.
What I have come to see is that love does not come in perfect circumstances. Often it comes wrapped in turmoil and dirty unlovable packages. When we stick with it, when we see past the outer and take the time to slowly break through the tough hard exterior...There is deep beauty, true love deeper and more unfathonable than we could have thought, known or imagined.
Sticking with friends, staying in a home when its not fun... is not easy. There are times when you don't like those around you...and there are times when you don't like yourself. But when it is the ugliest, the worst...that is when it is about to become the best. Or so a wise and wrinkled old grandpa once told me as he stared lovingly into the fading blue eyes of his wife of 50 plus years and answered the question of how they had stayed together for so many years.
Those friends who have stuck with us the longest... they love us not because we are super amazing and do the best for them all the time; but because they have seen past our crusty exterior and they have seen something in us that has called them to stay. So they stick with us through thick and thin whether we deserve it or not. We are all made to love and the beauty of true love is that it never runs out, it never grows thin...we may think we are made to only love one or two people at a time ...but the truth is that if your love runs out the more you are asked to love...then you aren't truly loving. Chances are you are actually giving in order to get and that is the opposite of love. That place where your love ends, terrifying as it may be, that is the place where God's love finally has the chance to begin. True pure deep Agape love. When we love not out of our own strength but out of the grace of God's love then we truly begin to know how deep and wide and powerful and awesome is God's love. But if we always stay where it is safe and in our control then we will never know the true and expounding freedom of true love.
Living with roommates, living in community makes this vividly clear. There are days when you don't want to love those around you and know you have reached your end and can't keep going. And there are those who choose to quit. But then there are those, and those seasons when you choose to press on to push through to show love...ESPECIALLY, when you don't feel like it. And when you ask God to give you the strength...and you choose to love in the slow and plodding daily routine ...it can be agonizing...but it is as if a dam inside of your sould breaks loose and suddenly you see that if you can love in this season, this person then you can truly do anything. The world stands before you and you can soar.
Then there are seasons when you realize that because you truly love this person...you have to walk away. Those are the most agonizing. Some may call it tough love...I call it ripping out one's heart. Leaving when you want to stay, making a choice that breaks you for the sake of them. I saw it in the face of a mother who had tears streaming down her face after she called the cops on her daughter...knowing her daughter may never understand...never forgive her; but it was the most loving thing she could do. Its messy. Its not easy. Its a fine and blurry line that we walk when it comes to love. Its often like closing your eyes and hanging on tight as you dip up and down on the rollercoaster we call love. There is no perfection...in fact perfection may keep you from ever getting on. The highs are so exquisite you hope they will never end and the lows can dip so deep you'll think you are at your end. But the ride is beyond words amazying, its the only way to truly live.
Yes yes yes. So True!
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