Tomorrow is my birthday. I will be welcoming in my life as a 32 year old… Although there are some gray hairs growing in and a few more wrinkles, I don’t really see how 32 looks much different than 31, but as I thought about what I learned this past year I thought I would share some of those lessons here:
1. 1. God loves me. And you. The most. But Equally.
We all long to be treasured. I long to be treasured. I am treasured. I am God’s favorite possession—I learned that this year, but so are you. Every single one of us can stand and say that we are the most important thing to God. It has been pretty life changing for me to allow that reality to wash over me. Once I began to feel treasured, and to see how much He truly treasures each of us, I no longer needed to be the MOST special… I became far more comfortable sharing that spot with you too!
I am also then free to live out my purpose—because being loved by God leaves me motivated. Having a purpose –serving God-brings me joy.
George Bernard Shaw said, “This is true joy in life, the being used up for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.”
My true joy doesn’t just come from being loved and treasured. My true joy comes from doing something with the motivation brought about by the catalyst of love.
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2. Love can hurt or it can heal.
I have fallen in love with a song from a movie I saw with my Aunt Laura and cousin Amanda. These two women are so very special to me. But for a long time I had little to no contact with either of them. When my parents divorced my relationship with my mom’s family fell apart. The loss of love between my parents had a ripple effect that I still don’t understand. This song says “You can be hurt by love or healed by the same….timing is everything”
Love is a powerful thing. The words to this song ring true for me because I have walked through several periods of my life where love has hurt SO badly. I am walking through one now.
Mother Teresa said, “I have found the paradox that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.” I believe her. I believe that when you love someone enough to withstand the difficult times that hurt, you eventually get to a place where the love heals the hurt. The hurt that love can bring is real. So is the healing.
3. 3. Sometimes our past hurts can prevent us from receiving what we want most.
I was recently having a conversation with Nyasha about the love we received from our parents and I was sharing stories about my grandpa. As I told the stories I could feel how real his love was for me. But I can also remember as a little girl, feeling differently. I desperately wanted to be loved, to feel the love of a father and mine was not really around. When my grandparents would do something to show their love for me (basically every day) I didn’t feel lavished in love. I felt they were loving me and caring for us out of some obligation they felt. I was so hurt by the hole my parents left that I couldn’t receive what was being offered to me—even when it was the thing I wanted the most.
Today as God continues to heal the pain from my past hurts, I can feel loved just by sharing a memory. I wonder how often I have missed the love God has been showing me because of a hurt I am carrying.
4. 4. Forgiveness costs.
I don’t often watch Oprah, but I caught a show one day when I was in the States and Oprah was telling a girl, “Forgiveness is letting go of what could have been.” I will never forget how my heart opened that day. Accepting what is. Letting go of what could have been. Loving someone for who they are, not what you want them to be. That is real love. It is hard. It is costly.
When I teach my parenting class, I have to teach about marriage as well. I am not married (yet) so I rely on the wisdom of those who are. An author that I respect says this, “Forgiveness is a decision to give up your perceived or actual right to get even with or hold in debt, someone who has wronged you.” (From fighting for your marriage) It is a decision to sacrifice, it is just as costly as forgetting a financial debt when someone owes you money. They both cost.
I read this and think it is beautiful. It was written by a woman who was publically humiliated when she learned that he husband (a pastor) was having an affair. “Love is powerful enough to erase a person’s sins. Love is forgiveness.”
This year I have learned that forgiveness is costly, and yet it brings with is something priceless: peace and freedom and REAL, TRANSFORMING LOVE.
5. 5. We are all Shunamite women
There is a small story about a woman in 2 Kings Chapter 4. This woman was kind and generous to the prophet Elisah. He wanted to bless her and found that she didn’t have a son. So he told her “Next year you will hold your son.” Her response was strange to me. She said, “Do not lie to me.” I imagine this as her looking at him with immense sadness, saying “I didn’t ask you to go there- why bring up the most painful thing, that deep desire that I have hidden in my heart from everyone, please don’t bring that up- don’t go there.”
I think I am a Shunamite woman, I think we all are. I believe we all have deep desires- some of which have not been filled yet. I think we probably all have something we desire that is so precious to us that we hide it, ignore it, try to detach from it so that we don’t have to feel the pain. The people closest to us might know not to go there in conversation, or they may not even be privileged to know of that deepest longing. But we know it’s there: things like career success, restored relationships, marriage, babies--big life things. We can’t hide from it, we will notice things that remind us that we are missing out. This woman probably saw babies everywhere she went and it probably hurt. She may have finally hidden that desire so deep in her heart so she could try to move on. And then here comes Elisha putting it out in the open, bringing it to the surface and giving her encouragement to hope again. But she did hope and she got her son.
To hope again after disappointment is to risk being hurt again.
This year I have learned that I have something in common with this woman...I have a deep desire hidden away from the world. What I am STILL trying to learn, is how to respond in faith the way she did.
A few years later when her young son died in her arms, when she looked down and saw her dream that she had held after such a long of wait fade away. How would she respond? She placed him in bed and told no one. When her husband asked why she was going to see Elisha she simply said, “It will be well.”
She didn’t scream and shout about how unfair life was that she waited so long for something, until she finally gave up hope and learned to live without a child, and then this man comes by promising her she will have one and she hoped again. And NOW her child has been taken from her. She could have went on and on about the injustice of the situation, but she didn’t. She went to Elisha and when his servant asked how things are she said again, “It is well.” I think she was afraid that if she spoke of the situation she might explode. Finally when she saw Elisha she let it out- she asked him “Did I ask you for a son? Didn’t I say to you, ‘Do not deceive me.” She refused to leave without him and when he arrived home with her, she received a miracle and got her son back.
What I am hoping to learn is that even when I see the thing I longed the most for die in my arms, to be able to say, “It will be well.”
