Sunday, February 19, 2012

Receiving

There are times we are sitting on the couch together watching TV, and my youngest daughter reaches up to my face, puts her hand on my cheek and just looks at me.

I am loved. It's very moving and reminds me of the wealth in my home. It is truly wonderful to receive.

So I'm sitting here today trying frantically to put together a late email for our church, and she walks in and eagerly asks me if I want a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Feeling the gurgle in my tummy already from the taco dip I just ate too much of for lunch, I'm about to say no, and I see how very excited she is to make this doggone sandwich. So I say, "Well, I am not too hungry, but if you make me one, I'll take a bite to see how good it is, and maybe we can wrap it up for later before church...?" She nearly sprinted from the room.

Its a few minutes later, and Sara Groves' song, "Honesty" is on.

...Here in the stillness where thoughts are born, 
Here in the frailty, we're tattered and torn. Tattered and torn. 
Here in confession, here in our mess. 
Here in the places we're mostly undressed. Mostly. 
Oh honesty, oh honestly
The truth be told for saving of our soul...

I'm thinking about Paul's comment in Colossians 1 regarding Epaphras' report on the Colossians' "Love in the Spirit." I'm thinking about how Jesus said all of the Law and Prophets hang on this one thing. I'm racking my heart and head, praying and leaning and talking a lot to God about how to communicate what it means for us to "love in the Spirit."

I'm coming up with this series of actions to take... things we have to do and things we must not do... I'm thinking about all of the wielding we have to do.

Just then my bedroom door quietly swings open to reveal Moriah, her two small hands holding a plastic yellow plate with this peanut butter and jelly sandwich that she made by herself... and she has this gigantic-huge smile on her face. Its hard to describe the quiet joyous care with which she walks across the room to place this gift on my desk.

I took a bite and showed how wonderful it tasted, then I asked if I could bag the rest and she burst from the room with the plate and sandwich saying, "I'll write your name on it too!"

A few minutes later, she comes back with the sandwich perfectly situated in the middle of some generic ziploc, with my name written across it... with J capitalized and backwards. It was perfect.

I received love in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with my name misspelled, and it was wonderful. It helps me love her more to receive her love.

Sometimes the deepest ways of loving are about what and how we are receiving it of others.

Isn't this what we are all really doing anyway? Receiving this beautiful gift called mercy from the Author of all things? It seems to me that with all of the focus on doing in Christianity, we forget the receiving we do.

All this purpose-driven everything that we keep reading about and striving for sometimes dances too closely to the output-based doing and consumer-driven mentality of a broken world.

Not always, but often enough.

Often enough to forget that in all honesty, all loving... real loving... starts with loving God. And last I checked, there is one heck of a lot of receiving that we do from Him. And good grief, if I could just learn to stop for a moment and receive from Him in all honesty and love... honesty about myself and love for who He is, I'd probably be that much closer to learning how to love others better.

Maybe even loving myself better.

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

So pick up your peanut butter and jelly, take a bite, and receive.
You are loved.

So much more than you can imagine.












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