People are important.
People are on Gods heart.
"For God so loved the world (people)..."- John 3:16
I want have a heart after God's heart, because I want to be as close to God as I can get til I die. To me, nothing is more meaningful than knowing my Creator since my hope rests in what will be forever: His glory.
How do I value people, or rather, do I value people at all?
What does it look like to genuinely value a person, and I'm not talking about your friends or family (although they are included), I'm mostly speaking about people. Any one person that comes across your path: your neighbor, the grocer, the old lady at the bus stop, the homeless guy passed out on the floor, the bellhop who takes your luggage at the hotel you stay at, the barista at Starbucks, the lady who sells you fruit, the big girl you sit next to on the plane, the guy with piercings and tattoos who sits alone with his laptop, and it goes on and on.
People are real and they are everywhere. Look around you or go outside, who do you see? But more importantly what do you feel when you see them? Does the thought of them maybe not having Jesus and a hope in eternity even cross your mind?
I ask myself, do people matter to me?
I am trying to understand myself, as I prepare to leave for outreach where I will be spending two months with the sole purpose of telling and displaying to people who Jesus is in hopes that they would know Him and enter into the hope of eternity with Him.
"...in hope of eternal life, which God, who never lies, promised before the ages began..." (Titus 1:2 ESV)
why is it that my heart doesn't really break for strangers who might be headed for hell?
I find it not ok with me that I am so unaffected and unmoved to really love others. Why do I not care for others the way I feel others have cared for me? Or moreso, why do I not love others the way God has loved me...even if just to a degree.
That bothers me...
I mean sometimes I really love people, sometimes, but most of the time it is more of a response of their love for me. I fear my love for others is rarely ever the initiator. And if it is, I am afraid that the motive behind such an initiative is selfish, perhaps to appear "good" or "humble". I just want to love because God loves me, and not for any other motive. But I find in me an uneasiness about the actual reason for why I do love some people and not others.
All my life many people have shown me so much love, and such an interest in befriending me. It has gotten so overwhelming that I am now, more than ever, so desiring a heart to love others the way God loves me.
Let's unravel my brain a little...
I am afraid of intimacy; this explains why I prefer to be by myself, and also why I say really odd and rushed sentences when a guy shows interest in me.
So a few thoughts have surfaced.
1. Perhaps I use a mask to give people the impression that I am "good", and in order to keep them focused on the mask I skip out of sight when they try to get too close in case my mask falls down by accident. This way I am Jamie: the always joyful and confident and sometimes witty gal.
However, this is something I have put an effort into avoiding. I try to tell people when and what I am struggling with and let my weaknesses show....but I have to question even that. When I do that are my motives pure? Is there something still in that action that still has some stem from my selfishness in self-glorification? Do I sometimes do that to appear humble? Because if so, it is so pointless. To appear humble is still wearing a mask. Sometimes my intentions are from a heart that is wanting so badly to make right what has gone wrong, and sometimes my intentions are crooked and selfish. Both are there, always warring within me.
2. Perhaps the sinful nature in me is just in every way contrary to Gods nature (which I actually believe it is), whereby making my selfishness the fuel behind why others matter less than how much I want them to matter to me.
"For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do." -Galatians 5:17
3. People are broken and in need of the fullness that only God can give them. As I struggle with overcoming my battles with sin, I find it difficult at times to be the hands and feet of God because I feel like a terrible representation of my perfect Jesus.
This is perhaps what stops me from ongoing fellowship with others on many accounts. I am afraid they will see me, the me that is sometimes so not pretty, and that would make my Jesus look bad, and yet still there is selfishness in that because it would also make me look bad, my mask would fall and they'd see a hypocrite.
And man I am reminded in this moment how grateful I am for what Jesus did on the cross...taking my hypocrisy and nailing it to the cross to make me clean.
4. Something that always pops up in my head when someone is trying to befriend me is that this person really wants to be my friend because they think I am rich. It's true that I have never known what it really meant to be "impoverished" or in debt, or really in need of anything. I have always had good food, good clothes, a car, a home, and all the other luxuries like movie theater nights, trips overseas, study abroad, dental care, skin care, iphone, a bachelors degree, and whatever else I've had. It's all this stuff. Yet, I myself am terrible at making money for a consistent amount of time. I tire easily and get burnt out if I work at the same place for over 4 months (freakishly similar to my dating records). So I myself would not be considered rich, but I tend to work to keep my life flowing comfortably in all my fluffy stuff.
Yet, I have never been in real need. I have felt, on numerous accounts, very anxious and fearful of reaching a point of being in need, but I have never actually ever reached the end of all my resources (in large part because of my parents who I know will help me out whenever I need them, but also I realize now that I have this idea that they have endless amounts of money, which when I think more clearly on I know is not true).
And, again, here I find my fingers tracing back to the root of all this which is my selfishness. It's about protecting all my stuff. This stuff feels sticky like the sweat that clings to me here in Cambodia making it very hard to stay asleep. Yet I want it, the stuff that is, not the sweat. But this selfish propensity to hold tightly onto stuff is as discomforting as the nightly sweat I hate so much. It makes me fearful and anxious. I am afraid of what it may be like to be in need, afraid I am not equipped to handle such a circumstance. I mean, what would I do? If I ran out of money....what would I do? I wouldn't be able to eat my organic vegan food, which is painful to think about. I wouldn't be able to buy another pair of high waisted shorts, also kind of painful to think about. But really, if I really ran out of money I'd be.....poor. Average. In need. Maybe even lacking some necessities like toothpaste or toilet paper. Then what? ....then what? Well, the only conclusion I can come to is that I would then be suffering, but not just suffering like I am suffering here in the heat and humidity, but I would be suffering in poverty. That's a whole different kind of suffering. That's like actually suffering. Whoa. That would be scary. And in unraveling this thought I see my neural gears kick into full self preservation mode, and I am all I see and care about. So if some person is just trying to befriend me to potentially use me for my money when my guard is down I can see how and why I am shunned at the idea of them getting any closer.
My selfish ambitions are deeply embedded in the unseen places of my heart.
"Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves."(Philippians 2:3 ESV)
The selfish and the selfless in me are the body and spirit in me. My good intentions are always there scattered among my bad intentions, almost inseparable at times.
Again, I remind myself that there is now no condemnation in me, but rather an overflow of thankfulness for Gods love and grace and mercy. That there is no sin in me too deep that Christ cannot uproot and throw away.
(Read Colossians)
This is also why I daily need to feed my spirit with Gods word, lest I let my body smother me with myself. But God says to love one another, so I must find out if and how I can do that.
--
And so loving others is proven difficult when all I really think about is myself.
Stop thinking about yourself.
I need to stop thinking about myself.
That's hard, sounds kind of impossible.
"But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26 ESV)
Hallelujah. Thank You God.
So in closing...
1 John 4:7-12
7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
I am gifted with interceding in prayer, I can start loving others by using my gift to bless and pray for them.
-j
Totes falling asleep now.
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