1 John 4:7-16 “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.”
Psalm 42:1-11 “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go to the house of God under the protection of the Mighty One with shouts of joy and praise among the festive throng. Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar. Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me. By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me— a prayer to the God of my life. I say to God my Rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?” My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me, saying to me all day long, “Where is your God?” Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.”
Love’s as Warm as Tears
Love’s as warm as tears,
Love is tears:
Pressure within the brain,
Tension at the throat,
Deluge, weeks of rain,
Haystacks afloat,
Featureless seas between
Hedges, where once was green.
Love’s as fierce as fire,
Love is fire:
All sorts–infernal heat
Clinkered with greed and pride,
Lyric desire, sharp-sweet,
Laughing, even when denied,
And that empyreal flame
Whence all loves came.
Love’s as fresh as spring,
Love is spring:
Bird-song hung in the air,
Cool smells in a wood,
Whispering ‘Dare! Dare!’
To sap, to blood,
Telling ‘Ease, safety, rest,
Are good; not best.’
Love’s as hard as nails,
Love is nails:
Blunt, thick, hammered through
The medial nerves of One
Who, having made us, knew
The thing He had done,
seeing (with all that is)
Our cross, and His.
~C.S. Lewis, Poems, (1964)
Your hearts desire! Have you ever dreamed or wished for something so passionately that when you actually obtained whatever “it” was, there seemed to be something missing? And, then there are times when you literally have no clue what your heart desires until one day, you see it and say, Ah…that’s it, that’s what I’ve been searching for but didn’t know you were even searching until that moment. C.S.Lewis, uses a phrase that completed a visual for me when he calls this discovery “the moment of fruition!” That pivotal moment when time and space seem suspended for you alone. My belief is that “these moments” are few, not necessarily rare but definitely not something that happens everyday. I know that I have been blessed with some “Ah, moments” in my life and just thinking about them warms my soul. There’s two life changing events in my life that forever changed me, the death of my mom. Realizing in a split second I would never see or talk with here again and that she was my greatest supporter, she loved me like no one else ever could or would. It’s bittersweet but I love her more than I ever thought possible. The second was falling in love, I was not prepared for it and it changed me in ways I never dreamed of. Life looks different when you love someone else as much as you love yourself, even more. These two examples would not even be possible if not for God and His love. My greatest “Ah” moment was the realization that my existence was only possible because of God and the desire to have something my best friend in school had, a personal relationship with God. I remember the night I told my mom I wanted to be saved, she called Pastor Max and we drove to his house and he and I spoke and prayed and I ask Jesus to save me. A lot of things and people helped to make that day come to fruition, it was all God’s Will. Sometimes we don’t see the “Ah” of a situation until we’ve lived through the experience but the point is in recognizing the moments, living into your heart’s desires, and as Christian’s that desire is in rhythm with God’s Will. My prayer for you today is for you to see what God sees in you, His child and He loves you without end! ❤
~Blessings and Peace~
Reference:
Preparing for Easter by C.S.Lewis
HOPE SEEKER 