Monday, April 6, 2009

the unlovely.

What I need today is an attitude adjustment. Because if this is all a test of my patience, I am failing miserably. 

I feel like I am surrounded by difficult people at absolutely every turn. People who it is a struggle  to treat with love and respect. 

Maybe this is all just a terrible case of the Mondays, but it feels deeper. It's like I've reached my breaking point, and if one moe person tries to get under my skin, I will blow. 

As I think about all this, I can't help but realize: this is about as un-Christ-like as it gets. 

He didn't just treat his friends with love. He reached out to the broken, the weary. The cruel and unjust. The immature. The incompetent. Those who didn't get His mission or His ministry. He loved them all. Why can't I? 

I am made in His image. I am bought with His blood. I am saved by His neverending grace. 

It's time for me admit: so are they. 

The unlovely are made in His image. They are bought with His blood. They are offered His neverending grace. 

The unlovely and I have a lot in common. We are immature and incompetent. We are hurtful and cruel. 

And we are loved by Someone who chooses to look past it all, who instead chooses to see our greatness. What we can become with Him. 

May I be more like that. 

May I love the unlovely. 

Because He loves me.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I will be praying for you. I sincerely thank God for growth in him and it is through that growth that we are able to appreciate the lovely bits of the otherwise "unlovely". Our mothers are actually kind of similar (very happy, sweet, devoted, kind and peppy) and it has just been recently that I have come to acknowledge that my moms way of looking at EVERYONE as God's precious though sometimes flawed creation actually pays off. I don't see her ranting about mistakes of others, or losing her temper over unwise words/actions of those all around her. She, through God's guidance calmly accepts and loves everyone and so on my best and worst days her love is unwavering, just like God's:) Don't give up!
Sabrina