Romans 12:9-13 ~“ Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another in showering honor. Do not be slothful or zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.”
Lately I have been feeling empty and distant from God again and could not seem to figure out why… I was constantly praying, going to church, was apart of community groups and surrounded myself by God fearing people, pretty much everything a Christian should do, and yet something was missing. So my Mom is famous for saying that “ when you hear something more than once, it’s most likely something you need to take to heed and stop everything you’re doing and pray about it because often that’s Gods way of poking at you to stop and listen to what he is trying to say.” My mom’s a smart lady, so I am always sure to take her wisdom to heart. Lately multiple people have been telling me that I need to learn how to love others because we are made in Christ’s image and he loved fiercely.. therefore so should we… and you're probably thinking, uh duh Asten it’s kinda in the job description of being a Christian… well thank you for pointing that out hahah, I’ve always known this and so whenever my close friends and family would tell me this I would simply blow it off, mainly because it’s not new information but also I had given up on loving people so long ago that I have pretty much forgotten how to. Now you're probably thinking goodness Asten come on thats the most typical excuse.. haha again, I know. But easier said than done. I wasn't always so hard inside, I used wear my little heart on my sleeve and loved everyone I came in contact with, sadly, because of the type of person that I am, I tend to give more than I get, whenever I do something from the heart I do it fiercely, and growing up the people I surrounded myself with sadly took advance of that. Eventually I started building a wall around my heart and became weary of others, and now here I am 22 with only a handful of people in my life that I can say that I actually love. However, recently the Lord has been putting it on my loved ones hearts to tell me that what I am missing is the love that I am suppose to be gladly giving away like Oprah… YOU GET LOVE, AND YOU GET LOVE… EVERYBODY GETS LOOOOOVEEEE!!!! I have been selfish only thinking about my well-being when I was not placed on this earth for my comfort, being a Christian is all about getting out of my comfort zone and I have been rejecting that fact. I am now willing to allow the Lord to work in me and open me up again, brush the cobwebs away from my caged heart. So I have been contemplating this fact the past couple of weeks but had no idea where the heck to start, how does one even began to love… and not just half heartily just because I have to, but passionately love others, I had no idea but I knew that God would reveal it to me. And low and behold he did it when I was least expecting him to
( classic God ).
YOU GET LOVE, AND YOU GET LOVE… EVERYBODY GETS LOOOOOVEEEE!!!!
The other day a good friend/ neighbor invited me to join her at her shift for the 48 hours of prayer that our on campus ministry was providing. It was a 7am shift and I was out two-stepping the night before and didn't get home till 4 am and bed till 5 so I had a fantastic 2 hours of sleep and was so close to bailing and sleeping in, but that darn Holy Spirit was nagging at my spirit so I got my butt out of bed and went with her to the house where the event was held. I had no idea what to pray for when I got there so I just quietly sat there waiting to hear something from the Lord, and AGAIN he came through!! He told me to open my bible to where it was already bookmarked, I had no idea what he wanted me to read so I just starred at it for about 5 minutes.. and then it suddenly popped out at me… WOW this is exactly what I’ve been looking for the past few weeks!! It was the scripture above!! It was so perfect! So fast forward to today, I have been reading that verse everyday for about a month now and although its still something that I have to constantly remind myself of, I have opened up more and more each passing day and have gotten to know so many people on deeper more intimate levels, I'm still growing but I'm excited to see what God does, hahah who knows he might have even more fun surprises up his sleeve.
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