I'll Come for You My Love

This video changed my husband's and my life.  The message that is given here I can not even summarize to give it justice.  It is just a powerful video of truths.  Take a minute to watch and let it soak into your heart.  

On Saturday our friend Jason performed a song that he had written about a father's heart.  The words say, "Hold on- I'll come for you my love.  "Hold on- I"ll come for you my love! I will run and not grow weary...a new day begins...I'll come for you no matter where you are! I'll lift every stone that's weighing down your heart...

I was reminded of this video when it says, "you don't mess with a father's heart..put a concrete wall in front of me and I'll tear through it with my bare hands,"  when Jason's song says "I'll lift every stone that's weighing down your heart."

This is how passionate God is for His children.  One Sought Me is about this kind of purposeful and intentional love.  God sought me, loved me, and calls me His own.  This is our focus, to learn more about this kind of love and to show it to others by what our lives reflect of the Father's love.  For our family, it's through adoption.  

After an absolutely amazing event on Saturday, (May 4) one that only God could have helped assemble together, I was reminded of our focus.  So many distractions can get in the way, planning, paper work, e-mails, contacts, signatures, meetings, deadlines, etc. that the focus gets clouded over and lost in the haze and dust.  Not that we ever loose this hope and image in our hearts of these two precious children we are adopting, because we think of them constantly, but the journey just gets long and the road kicks up the dust.  

Todd and I were blessed by the people who came out the event.  Their hearts were touched by the love of the Lord and the gathering of His people.  They cared about a good cause and came out to support it.  That's all.  period.  That simple.  We saw the pure unity of Christ there that night.  Beyond the walls of the church, beyond the labels of denominations and organizations, it was just people coming together for people out of love.  We felt the love, I know those who were there felt it too.  They are our church family and those whose hearts were there in prayer not presence.  Not necessarily those who warm a pew next to us each Sunday or who show up in the same building that we do that one day a week, but the family that reaches beyond attendance of the body of Christ within the walls.  These people who came out, some of them, we have not corporately worshiped with in over 5 years, but they know us, know our hearts, and they love us just the same as if we shared a hymnal together yesterday. That's what Christ's people do.  They go beyond the walls and ignore the club-membership status that so often churches get tied up in.  It's a trap, and one that Satan enjoys being played out.  "Keep to our own" they'll say and they mean it with a passion hurting good people along the way.  Not a message you'd hear Christ repeat, but yes, it happens way to often among the "Christians" too.  I pray for these people that the blinders would be lifted and their eyes would see the freedoms offered through Christ. The freedoms that do not bind us to walls and organizations, but just simply celebrating the love of Christ in unity.  

  Matthew 5:8 "Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God." 

"I felt like we just had church"  was a repeated comment that we heard after the event.  It was like we went back in time to an outdoor service that was recorded in the book of Acts or something!  I'm serious, God's presence was that strong, and only He was being praised, not man, not good works, but just all by His love. Can I hear an 'amen'?  Because it's true.

We love because He first loved us.  1 John 

I can't help but think of James 1:27. It says this: "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."  Confession time-I didn't know this verse even last year.  When God showed me, my eyes were opened to this new kind of love that I never knew about my God.  It's like a secret room found in a house you've always lived in but never knew existed.  God is showing me a different side to Him through this adoption and I'm so excited about it that Todd and I want to shout it out in the streets so others can know too. There's a new kind of love out there! Accepting, embracing, seeking, and claiming one as our own family. 

Let's get back to the verse a bit.

What does this verse NOT say:  "A religion that the Lord God sees as pure and faultless is this: to care for our own, because we have to care for our own before we can reach out to others."  NOPE. 

"A religion that the Lord God sees as pure and faultless is this: worshiping and serving in a building only but not on the other 6 days of the week by the way you live your ungodly lifestyle."  NOPE.

"A religion that the Lord God sees as pure and faultless is this: rules and regulations, codes and by-laws, classes and courses needed for approval first in order to love God the way He asks you to love Him."  NOPE. 

"I didn't write the book people, don't get upset with me." (stole that line from one of the speakers at the event- an adoptive mom).  And I'm not passing judgement for those who don't live by James 1:27 because I for the last 35 years haven't paid one bit of attention to that verse!!  And I can't say I've perfected it or I get my 'check mark' because we are adopting.  There is much work to be done in my heart and what my life shows for it.  But what I am doing is that now that I know, I want others to know too.  Not to condemn them but to open their eyes to this kind of amazing love and service that is pure before the eyes of the Lord!!  There is good news to be shared!! There is a love out there I never knew before and it involves caring for orphans and widows!!  This is the heart of the Lord! His eyes are upon them watching them and waiting for His people to rally around them and stand up for them!  I want to be one of those people who reach the lost, the hurting, and the hopeless in the name of Christ's love.  I want to rescue an orphan child who has no hope, no family, no future, and no one to turn to.  But do you know what I'm learning?- It's not just the children who is being rescued, but it's another set of two- Todd and I.  Doors are opening and this adoption goes from 2 children lives changed to the lives of our family, to the lives of those we encounter and share our story, to the 150+ people who came out to the event and they felt the passion and love too!  And God just keeps on goin'.  He has great plans, I see it unfolding and....I....and I... just cry.  I am so humbled to think that Todd and I get to even be a part of this all....it blows my mind that He is using us plain ordinary people to do great things for Him. 

Sometimes I don't know if I can do this anymore. I think of  going back to not knowing......  But that's not gonna happen!!! and that thought only lasts a second!!  I won't let the enemy have that satisfaction. That's just me counting on myself not counting on what God can do nor allowing Him to use me to carry out His purposes!  Use me Lord!

Philippians 1:6 "Being confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ."