Validation is Encouraging

My best friend Shawny (I miss her!) and I used to encourage each other in truth and talent and help and praise. It was awesome. We both needed it, having somewhat particular (in her case) and critical (in my case) parents. So we met that need for encouragement for each other growing up. Perfect, right? Well, we ended up in other parts of the country and we don’t get that all the time. So when I hear encouraging morsels from the Bible, good books, blogs, audience members, church family members, band family members, etc., it is invaluably emcouraging. Validation is encouraging, not to hear how great I am doing or be puffed up like a peacock, but to know I am on the right track and helped someone or encouraged them. So never be afraid to encourage in truth someone. It is not about their ego but may just give them a burst of light in their day and help them know if they are doing ok. Feedback is important and precious. Intelligent people actually want to get/do better. Love them that way, it’s good.❤

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Loving an Iffy Furry Friend

Adopting a dog from the SPCA with heartworm has affected my empathy and mothering skills. After 2 days, I love our furry friend and he is one of the family. We have to exercise him a little but without stress or strain, have to give him medicine twice a day before his first shot Thursday and keep him very calm after that for a month. It is deliberate care, intentional love. We knew going in he was sick. And we love him all the more for it. We know it is up to God through thr medicine to heal him or not. We love him and he is very loved until we know for certain if it is forever or not.

And I think that is how it is with God. I understand that better. He really loves us and adopts everyone who humbly asks Him to. He knows we are iffy. He knows we may screw up, knows we may reject treatment or choose to run away. He loves us all the more when we really try to please Him, as when Blue tries to please us. It is endearing. We accept him as He is, hoping to nurse him to health, and God must feel that way with us, accepting us as we are and hoping to nurse us and love us to greater health and joy wanting the best life for us. I get it now. And I praise God and love Him all the more for it.❤❤❤

True Love Remains

True love remains.

If “love” left, it was never truly love.

True love remains.

If “love” cheated, it was not love.

True love remains faithful.

If “love” hurt deeply, it was not love.

True love remains protective.

If “love” lied to you, it was not love.

True love remains honest.

If “love” involved secrets, it was not love.

True love remains open.

If “love” was selfish, it was not love.

True love remains sacrificial.

Jesus loves you. This I know. The Bible tells me so. We humble ones belong to Him. We are all weak but He is so strong. And Jesus actually did die for you then rose for your option to live with Him forever in heaven. That is what true love looks like.❤

Washed in Love

God loves you. He loves me too. We are washed in His love from the onset of our creation. Everything He does is motivated by His love for us. He even gave Hj is Son Jesus Christ as a sacrifice to redeem the breach sin made. He even gives us choice whether to be saved or not. He loves us. We are drenched in God’s love. And so it is no surprise that He loves us so well and answers our humble prayers. Oh how He loves us. We need to love Him back truly- love with our words and with our actions. We can never deserve such a free gift of such enormous love from God, but we sure should try to please Him and love back. Otherwise, we are spoiled brats. I want to be an appreciative daughter. I choose to love.❤❤❤

Healing Broken People

Most people I know are broken. Most often you don’t see their brokenness until they are humble enough or comfortable enough to show it in front of you or just can’t help but show it because of the depth of that brokenness. The few unbroken are in denial/lies, ignorant of their brokenness or about to be broken. So brokenness is a truth of humanity. This is due to the pride sin we inherited from the first prideful sin in the garden. But I digress. Blame is stupid and unproductive. It remains that people are broken.

Now, as a healer (someone who basically cares about the broken and has faith that God can heal them), I help heal the broken. How is that when I myself am also human and therefore also broken? The answer is the faith thing. The answer is always God. I cannot heal a person, even as a doctor, unless that person humbly admits there is a problem and believes there is help available to them. Humility has to be present and a humble prayer to God to step in and heal. Then healing starts. It is rarely if ever immediate. Healing starts. God does this to not overwhelm us and form a careful scar that is helpful and not dead. And how do we develop humility in people to start this? Prayer and loving on the person. It is a process, a relationship. This is God’s plan. A community that helps each other and cares for each other in worship to Him. Until restoration happens in heaven, we all have to be broken together and share love and knowledge that humble prayer promotes God’s healing useful, beautiful scars. It is the only way it works beautifully like that. Love plus humble prayer in faith.❤

Loving People Anyway

People often stink. They just really often think in a myopic, selfish way and it is just stinky behavior. And they talk that way or only talk to get their way. That happens a lot. We have a daughter that doesn’t have the courtesy to call unless she needs money. She won’t even return our call for us to get the grandkids their presents. We love her anyway. I love everyone anyway. Here is how. I remember how stinky my behavior is sometimes and that God loves me anyway. He has poured that grace on me out of love. So, I can return His love by living the people He lovingly made. Despite how they act, they are His creation and He loves them and wants them saved. So disrespecting them and not showing love to them is like spitting in His face and I really, REALLY don’t want to ever do that. So I love because God first loved me. That is how I do it. It is the only way you can. It is being the light to them so they remember the warmth and beauty the light brings and want to return to it.❤

God is Fair

God is fair. I hear people say He is not, but they just do not understand. God has unlimited power, more than the best imagination on earth can fathom. And yet He made a plan and wrote it down for us in the Bible so we all know what it is. We know from that Bible what God’s will is, what His plan is, how it will happen, what we need to do to be saved and what will happen next. That is extraordinarily fair. He made a plan, wrote it down for us, gave us the plan, and is following the plan. You cannot get more fair than that. Everyone is on the same page as far as having the knowledge about and chance to be saved. We all know. So God is more than fair unequivocally.

People use the fairness argument s a cop out and to blame God for wanting us to worship Him rather than ourselves or the drug of their choice. People are selfish and want what they want, this myopic view that robs them. They believe the lie that obedience is oppressive when in fact, it frees us to joy and peace but doing whatever we want leads to sadness and depression.

God made us and all of us inside wants Him. God is the only One who can satisfy. And He loved us enough to be very fair and make a plan, write it down in the Bible, get it to us and follow the plan. And He goes above and beyond fairness to grace by helping us follow His plan whenever we ask. He loves us that much!!❤❤❤