Love Is the Thing
I have come to the end of myself as they say - and what I mean by that specifically is that I have come to the end of my own strength. I am TAPPED OUT, do you hear me? This wife and mama has no more juice and my body has been letting me know very clearly she can do no more on her own.
But you don’t really think I’m about to quit do you? NOPE! I just have to pull from another source, and do you wanna know what it is?
L-O-V-E…..
If I’m being honest (which I hope you’ve come to know I will be even at my own expense), I am a rule follower - give me a rule and a parameter and honey this lady will not disappoint, it is part of what has helped me succeed in certain aspects of life. But if you recall in previous thoughts that I’ve shared (see True Love’s Approval) I struggle with the need to perform in order to gain approval, and my rule following is no exception. Without even realizing, much of my commitment to my family has come from a misguided sense of what it means to be “obedient” in my call as a wife and a mom - and part of that “obedience” has been attached to doing good works, which we all know in and of themselves are empty offerings when they are not deeply (properly) rooted.
Jesus wants us to love like He does. His love is energizing and life giving; it is rejuvenating and liberating - none of which I have been feeling lately. His love is NOT rooted in legalism - it is rooted in freedom, which means that my commitment to and love for Vic and Miles cannot survive on rule-following (legalism); it will only thrive when I rest in my first love, where freedom lives.
Sometimes Love (Jesus) will call me to say “No” - no to the very things that make me “feel” like I’m a good wife and mother and I’m going to learn to be okay with that.
“If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give away all my possessions, and if I give over my body in order to boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.”
