Tangled Up In Your Feet

‎"To truly live. To choose love through the costliest of risks. To choose peace over comfort. To see the lifeline in your promise before the circumstances around you conspire to agree. To know that there is always a cost to love and that it is always worth paying. To choose to see scars as Life’s signature..." Gabi Dickinson, young missionary to Uganda

Some ppl can go thru horrible circumstance and still live selfishly, never understanding this truth.. others can merely witness it in the lives of others and empathize so deeply that such love becomes a part of their heart forever.. some ppl live a life that others cannot imagine and will never know because the appearance of things fails to reveal the depth and reality of the scars they carry in their body and on their heart... the key is who God has called you to be... we are all selfish ppl to some degree... how much of self are we willing to give up, how much hurt are we willing to endure, whether or not we receive comfort for our pain in this life, no matter if others offer sympathy and compassion or NOT, whether no one ever knows the whole truth of our suffering or not... God sees, He values every tear, he values every act of faith, he treasures every sacrifice made in love... God sees... you matter... he will carry you, he will equip you, he will cry with you... Jesus wept, he is fully God and fully man... he did not cease to feel and express those feelings just because he ascended.

We look at others and their issues seem huge or they seem very small... and yet, we watch them and we judge them and we measure their lives to our own tho God continually says not to. We are to watch Christ and follow him, and we are to love ppl in their hurt and their failure and their success.. we are to hate their sin, their selfishness, and the circumstance of this sick sick world... but we are not to lose site of the truth that this life has purpose, you have purpose, we all have purpose... and God loves us despite the stink we are covered in and the yuck we puke up and willingly consume again and again. That's Bible... like a dog to it's own vomit... change only comes when we choose to change... one thing at a time.. each in it's own timing, each as God works a process in the fabric of who we are, some work is quick, and some is very time consuming, and some we will never master... but all he asks is that we have a heart that sincerely tries.

All we gotta do is make up our mind, ask him how to do it, and he leads us in how to change that one thing that he is talking to us about in this moment. Different conversations with each of us, but God is talking to you, to me, to every person on this earth... in our own love language, in our vastly different needs... to bring us further away from who we were to who we want to be... go with him, go with God, his Spirit is the hound of heaven and will track you and tangle himself all up in your feet to get your attention and to let you know that his presence is always with you, always loving you, never giving up on you, never abandoning you... my daughters dog annoys the **** out of me every time he is loose cuz he walks on my feet and has to brush up on my ankles when you try to run with him... it's his way of letting me know he is there and he loves me and enjoys time with me...

Love God, Love Ppl, tangle yourself up in their feet and in their path not so that you become annoying, but in a way that wins their heart. I love that goofy silly cheesey dog... cuz he makes a point to love me... how much more does Christ love us as his creation, as his children? How can we think we know how to love better than he does?

To love like Christ... is to live like Christ.