Loving the Unlovely

We all know that if you pray for patience you better mean it, because God is going to lovingly try your last nerve. What about praying for humility? Be serious about this one too, because again God is going to lovingly supply you with an opportunity to make a fool of yourself. He knows, like we know, that we learn from experience. I can tell Axl how to ride a bike, but until he experiences it he can't possibly know how to do it. I don't need to point out the obvious correlation between falling off the bike and falling in our attempts to be patient and humble do I? I didn't think so.

Okay, so what about this prayer, "God help me to love like you love." This has been my prayer recently, because like I stated yesterday, I often don't, um honestly that should read, don't often react with love. Of course, I'm a sentimental sap who cries at gymnastics, but I struggle with loving the unlovely. You know the ones who drive slow in the left lane, mumble at the drive thru, and text while they're walking. While these things may make the most loving person frustrated, they send me into a tirade causing my heart to blacken and my mouth to light up. Seriously, waiter's, clerks, old ladies and small children (I kid with the last two...kind of) they don't see a lot of Jesus in me. My prayer has been that my mouth and my attitude would become so disgusting to me that I would have no choice but to respond differently, to respond with love. Now, maybe you all knew this and didn't share it with me (we'll deal with that later) or maybe you too had no idea that when you pray this prayer God will lovingly bring every unlovely person within a 10 mile radius into your path on a daily basis.

Now, what do you do with such a warning? My advice - completely disregard it. Be prepared, but don't let it stand in your way of seeking to love others like He does. One amazing thing that has happened over the last few week is that I have become very aware of all the times that I am being unlovely to my Jesus throughout the day. I remember that He is loving me in the midst of it and it reminds me that if He, perfect, holy, God can love me while engaging in the activities that sent Him to a cross then I can certainly love the lady driving 5 miles UNDER the speed limit making me 6 minutes late to the encounter I have planned with the man at Burger King who will struggle to hear me say "Whopper."

In giving me so many opportunities to practice loving more like Him, I have had some successes. Warren and Axl are probably sad that they missed them...I kid I kid. My attitude and my mouth are becoming disgusting to me, and my heart is stretching as I give more of it to the Holy Spirit. And like the song says I know that, "He's still working on me, to make me what I ought to be. How loving and patient He must be, 'cause He's still working on me." Thank you Jesus for that.

With much love,

Tonya