Purpose 2: What Can I Change?

Do you get magazines in the mail?  My last and only subscription expired recently, and I have vowed to take a break.  My weakness is Better Homes & Gardens.  I love lingering through the pages during hot soak in the bath.  It constantly nudges my creative self to want to do, change, and fix.  I think of all these things that could be better in our home.  Maybe I should paint that dresser, or perhaps I could make a wreath from those vines in the back yard.  Hey, I think I could make that 27 layer chocolate cake....

Whether it is home magazines, fashion, or tabloid, we all see images constantly that spur us to change.  Trying a new hair style or repurposing grandma's old scarfs are changes that are pretty harmless.  Often times though, the changes we want to make dig a little deeper.  We forget all the fluff and frill and techno magic required to create the lovely images on print covers.  We even forget when we read blogs and surf the web that people edit and crop (even those we know very well).  Social networking lets us put exactly what we want seen in public view, yet hides everything we want to keep private.  We all live in this world...this double-sided world.  We have our internet-digital-camera-insta-filter-magazine-life and our daily, real unedited life.  Sometimes those two worlds collide in ugly ways and we think change is needed. 

Not all change is needed.

I once heard a lady on the radio say something like, "I can't do all things well all the time, but I can do some things well some of the time." That resonated with me for some reason.  In our Pinterest- career-woman-organic-farming-homemade-ganache-making society we have created, we often feel as though somehow we are, or can be, equipped to be all and do all.  That is unbelievably untrue and it is a lie that we all buy in to from time to time.

We cannot begrudge ourselves when we realize that 27 layers of chocolate cake is not only ridiculous but is also unnecessary.  We cannot lament hours over not making organic baby food, or even being able to successfully host a dinner party.  We should never impose on ourselves the need to know how to do everything all the time.  God did not make us that way.  He made us each with our individual strengths.  When pooled together it creates a lovely tapestry of His creative hand.  That unity in diversity brings Him glory.  What isn't very glorious is when we get caught up in the wrong side of our double-sided world.  Life doesn't have a cropping feature.  We can not filter out some things.  We cannot blur the edges and highlight our blue eyes so they glow when we walk through town.  We are what we are.  Human. We are made in God's image.  We are unique, individual, and one-of-a-kind. 

But, some change is needed.

Sometimes we need to change the habits that start the snowball pattern of self doubt.  Sometimes, we need to unplug and just go for a walk. We need to put the camera down, leave the tablet at home, and just be.  We need to learn to know people for real.  We need to know those next door and around the corner.  We need to spend real time face to face knowing the unedited side of life.  We desperately need that change.

We need to allow God to comfort our hearts, not the internet.  We need to find strength in real friends, not just cyber ones.  We need to touch real hearts and give real hugs.  We need that kind of change.  We need that kind of humility. 

Take a break from pinning, surfing, and capturing.  Take a stroll.  Meet a neighbor.  Show off your real strengths that God actually gave you.  Show off your heart.  Show off your love.  Then, when you do flip back over to the cyber world -you can meet it head on and take it for what it is and enjoy it appropriately. 

The love chapter in scripture comes to mind when I think about our culture today.  It doesn't matter what we post, pin, or produce. If we are not loving, we are nothing.  We can nip and tuck.  We can change many things about ourselves. But if we don't offer our love, we have accomplished nothing.   The following is 1 Corinthians 13 from The Message version of scripture.  Read over it and think about love in our modern-world.  What can we change about ourselves that would be any better than our capacity to love?

If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.

² If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.

^3-7 If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

^8-10 Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

¹¹ When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

¹² We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

¹³ But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.

What is your purpose?  That is simple.  Love. If we need to change anything, it would be to love more.  What gifts were you given that you can use to show love?  The last post I asked what is something you just love to do?  This time I am asking you to take those things and share them with someone else!  Why do you think God gave them to you?  He wants you to share that part of Him with others.  He wants you to share that love. 

Take courage friends, love is real.  We can receive it and we can gift it.  The best part.....we can do both!

Please share your thoughts and discussion in the comments.