Something that I have been seeking so desperately is the willingness to go wherever God has called me to go. During the last week of ministry in Moldova my team did a fun exercise where we wrote on pieces of paper "left", "right", and "straight" and drew a piece of paper at each crossroads we reached. It was one of my favorite moments because it brought us to people who were needing a touch from God right at that time. That is how I've been approaching this whole idea about where God plans to take me – will it be to go left to a tiny hut in the African bush? Or maybe straight into the slums of India? My thoughts have always gone to physical places and ministries.
And then it hit me. I realized that where God wants to take me is not a physical place, but an emotional and spiritual one. It has been laid so clearly on my heart that my calling is simply to embrace love. I want to know how to love as God loves. Wholely. Completely. Unconditional. I want to choose to love each and every person I come into contact with, and I want to love people as themselves. I want my heart to break for people's hardships and to feel utter joy in their happy moments.
But before I can truly pour out such a deep, pure love on others, I need to have a fuller realization of the love that God has for me. God has challenged me to seek more of that. To let go of any notions I have about love, to not hold back because love has hurt me in the past. I have asked God to reveal that love to me, to strip me of my worldly view of what love is and each day show me more and more of what His love is. I want His love to wreck me, to overwhelm me. To allow me to see people differently. I want to toss aside my tendancy to judge. To see a homeless person on the street and not just walk past with the assumption that they chose their circumstances, but to see their worth in God's eyes and act on that.
I'm ready for God to take me on a journey where I learn what love really is. Before leaving on this trip my mom gave me the following verse from Hosea:
Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the winderness and speak tenderly to her. there I will give her back her vineyards, and will made the Valley of Achor a door of hope. there she will repond as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. "In that day," declares the Lord, "you will call me 'my husband' "…I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the Lord.
This is my prayer. That God will lead me to a place where I learn what it means to love and to be loved the way He defines love. I know it'll be a time of healing as I set aside lies, burdens, and distractions and enter into a deeper intimacy with God. Where God takes me with it, I will go.
