Control part 4
All my life I never really had very much ambition. Never wanted anything. Never wanted to do anything. Just kind of went from one thing to the next. My grandma used to call me a tumbleweed. Really it wasn't until I kind of started a family--and met my pastor--that things started to get real. Because that was when I started to feel compelled to actually DO something with my life. Compelled by love. The love of those in my life--and, more specifically, taking care of those in my life--is what started to control me. And I gotta tell you, it didn't feel like a burden. It felt like a purpose. I think that's one of the coolest things about the sacrifical love of God; when you love someone it doesn't FEEL like a sacrifice. In fact, it feels like the exact opposite. Because it doesn't feel like you're losing anything, even though you're giving away everything you've got. When you take that proverbial leap of faith (even though we're called to WALK by faith, not LEAP... and sometimes the baby steps are the biggest leaps of all...) and get over your fear that you'll lose what you've got, that's when you start to EXPERIENCE what you've got on a deeper, more excellent, perfect level. Because even though you ARE laying your life down for your friends (just as Jesus did for us on the cross), what you're really doing is SHARING your life with your friends. When you understand what it means to be connected to the inexhaustible supply of love--the God that IS love living inside you--that you know you can't give it away to the point where you have nothing left. You always have seomthing left. You can always give a little more. Love a little more. You can experience the height, and depth, and length, and breadth of God's love by TESTING the limits of His love. And finding out that He HAS no limits! That His love is bigger and better than we could ever imagine. We put limits on it, and we try to control it, and we end up missing out on it. Remember Jesus said He is the door and anybody who tries to enter the sheepfold any other way is a thief and a robber. When we do anything but let love control us we are robbing ourselves of the gift (of eternal life) that we've been given! And we're robbing others of being able to experience what we've got. I'm telling you--God has put people in your life that only you can affect. People need what we've got. They need us to BE US. To bless them with the blessings we've been given. To receive and release that glorious gift. Jesus said eternal life is knowing the Father and the One whom He sent. It's that Father/Son relationship. That unconditional love relationship. Letting love lead us and guide us. We are slaves to righteousness and prisoners of Christ, right? Because His love controls us. His love compels us... to love. Because we are filled to overflowing with it. And it's not too good to be true. It's so good that it MUST be true! It's too good to keep to ourselves. THAT'S how love controls us. By giving us something that we just have to share. And when we share it, we experience it! It's kind of like, use it or lose it. Only by giving it away do we really "have" it. Only by giving up control are we really "in" control!