More Love

My husband and I just returned from our second missions trip to New Orleans in the past 4 years---each one post-Katrina. We were especially thankful to share this trip, not only with our youth group, but with our oldest son, as well.

New Orleans.
Down there, we're so intentional.
We are, it seems, always "on."
Always looking for opportunities:
opportunities to love those rejected by others;
opportunities to give and serve without considering personal risk or cost;
opportunities to speak truth and hope and life into the heart of one who so desperately needs it;
opportunities to let Jesus use us in whatever way He chooses.

I'm convicted.  Deeply.
Here, in my small midwestern town,
day to day life finds me
comfortable.
lazy.
apathetic.
Shamefully, I'm not looking for those same opportunities when I leave my home.
I want my personal time.
I don't want the needs of others to infringe on my own life.
In my heart, I'll "cross on the other side" when seeing one who is different from me.
I don't want to give till it hurts; don't want to risk anything.
I often waste God-given opportunities to speak Jesus' words of life into the hearts of those who are without hope.

The contrast is stark.
And the realization hurts.


{Our guys praying outside the home of an elderly friend they'd made that week.}

I long for my heart to reflect Jesus in the ways I love and give and serve everyday, not just for a week every couple of years.
I don't want to have to go somewhere else for God to move my heart with compassion for the lost;
I want to be tender and sensitive to their needs when I go to the grocery store, the baseball bleachers, or my own front yard.
It's not a matter of simply trying harder or doing better.
It's all about Jesus:
His extravagant love poured out on me.
And me, learning to love Him more and more
and being a willing, available vessel through which He can do His thing.
That's my longing and my prayer.