God taught me a lot about unconditional love and steadfast love this month in Ethiopia.
I had a moment this past month where I felt disappointed.
I had the expectation to see so many big miracles on the race.
In that moment of feeling disappointed, God gently whispered love, it’s about love.
Loving one another with the love that God loves us and then showing that love to the world.
Be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another, earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:7-8
Love changes everything.
Loving people is hard. It brings us to the very end of ourselves. Loving is messy. But loving people is never in vain, because in loving people, we know more of Him, regardless of the end result. God is love, and as we love in His name, He is glorified.
The first church spoken of in Acts 2 spread because of their devotion and love for one another.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “I have community with others and will continue to have it only through Jesus Christ. The more genuine and the deeper our community becomes, the more everything else between us will recede, and the more clearly and purely will Jesus Christ and his work become the one and only thing that is alive between us.”
Jesus was always God. He always had the ability to start His ministry. But He waited till His Father told Him that it was His time. In the waiting time, He was living a perfect life, a holy life devoted to His Father, and knowing His father.
And when His ministry did begin, at the heart was love and discipleship. One life changed at a time, by getting down in the dirt with them. A life of laying down His self.
During Jesus’ ministry, I think it was more about Him stopping what He was doing, looking at the people, and seeing them.
He loved deep.
I’ve realized on the race that living radical isn’t about where you live; it’s about how you love.
There is beauty in being attentive to one person, in hugging one orphan, in not retaliating with a mean word when a mean word is spoken to you, in washing the dishes for your mom, in looking up from your book to listen to your friend or family member who needs someone to step into their pain with them, in taking a walk with someone who needs to process, in praying for a hurting friend or a hurting stranger. He is glorified in our ordinary moments.
To dwell in the place I have been given. To love the people I have been given. God is glorified when we faithfully do the thing right in front of us.
The friendly hello to the cashier, the simple question how are you to the person you just met or ran into at the coffee shop, the hug you give instead of hurting words to your best friend. It’s in building up the body, fighting for brothers and sisters in Christ who are losing hope and fighting lies, and praying for your loved one every single night to encounter Jesus.
We run through life, missing so many moments. What if we took time to see the people around us. And look for Him in every moment.
Katie Majors says small acts of His love become whispers of His glory.
The day I was feeling down and disappointed, a friend sat down next to me, and shared with me how much I had changed her life and changed the course of her race experience. I brought to this squad the gifts the Lord gave me specifically. We aren’t meant to look like others. We are meant to loves others in the ways He has loved us personally.
Spending time with children can show you how to truly love someone unconditionally. They can reject you at times or make you feel foolish, but that’s what unconditional love is. Loving when you aren’t always loved back. Loving when it’s hard.
Jesus never gave up. Just like Worke, one of our house moms. She told me about all the tears she’s cried over the years for her family to come to know Christ. She prayed for 20 years for her brother to come to know Christ. That’s agape love. Beauty is in the waiting.
What really counts is not the big things we start and create and do, but the quiet devotion practiced in our private moments.
What will matter most at the end of our lives are these people right in front of us who get to see all of it, the happy stories and the tragic ones, the pretty-good parts of us and the ugliest parts of us. At the end of time, all that will count is that we lived the Gospel with our very lives, that we paid attention to the people God gave us and dwelt knowledgeably and hospitably in the place to which He called us. No matter where we go, that is what will matter. – Katie Majors
Faithfulness is when we pour into hard people over and over, when we continue to serve in difficult situations. Faithfulness is a habit formed in our hearts when no one is looking.
All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness.- Psalm 25:10
So I suppose that for those who are watching, there are always miracles. Love produces a miracle every single day.
