The Affective Love of God

It's been crazy long since I've posted here since I've been so busy blogging book reviews over at aguyagirlandateenbookblog.com, but I read this passage in Brennan Manning's The Furious Longing of God this morning and had to share:

"The wild, unrestricted love of God is not simply an inspiring idea. When it imposes itself on mind and heart with the stark reality of ontological truth, it determines why and at what time you get up in the morning, how you pass your evenings, how you spend your weekends, what you read, and who you hang out with; it affects what breaks your heart, what amazes you, and what makes your heart happy."

Am I letting the unfailing love of God affect my every moment? Lord, let your love seep into my every moment.

Evening Prayer

Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come. He's Lord over every moment of history, every fleeting second of the present, and every anticipated tomorrow (for eternity!), and that's the God who holds my life in His beautiful hands. How could I ever think this life was about me? And why would I ever want to be the one in control? Oh, God, how You must laugh when I try. Please forgive the times I take the brush from Your masterful hand in order to create a mess of muddied color on a canvas for which you planned an exquisite masterpiece.

This is my evening prayer. Take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee. Take my will and make it Thine. It shall be no longer mine.

Wisdom in the Little Voices

One of the reasons I love working with middle school girls is the way God can still manage to surprise me and speak through their precious 13-year-old voices. Yesterday I was sitting next to Mackenzie May when she pointed at my 3-inch scar from my melanoma (removed 2 years ago) and asked, "Do you like your scar?" I shook my head because who likes ugly 3-inch scars in prominent places? She replied with what I thought was a strange answer at the moment, "Well, I do. You wouldn't be Stefanie without it." I was taken aback at first by her response, but after a few seconds, the wisdom hit me like a ton of bricks.

Our scars do make us who we are. I wouldn't be who I am today without the hope, healing, and trust I learned through recovering from cancer. All the pains, trials, and heartbreaks I have ever experienced have collectively brought me closer to Jesus and helped me realize a little more of who I am in Him, and I wouldn't trade them for the world. Mackenzie's little comment was a sweet reminder of that fact and brought to my memory one of my favorite passages, "Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us." (Romans 5:3-5, emphasis mine). I'm so grateful that hope in Him will never disappoint and that He knows ahead of time every hurt that will come my way and how He'll use it to draw me closer to Him and make me more like Him. And I'm so glad God uses teenage girls to speak to my heart. :)

The Prayer of Saint Francis

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

---Saint Francis of Assisi, 1181-1226

Tragedy from Above

Manhattan as seen from the ISS 8 years ago. Chilling. http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/iss003e5387_feature.html

Take some time to pray for those families today.