At my highschool graduation dinner, my friend's dad brought up the Fruit of the Spirit. I remember him speaking over me that I knew Love. I knew how to receive love and I knew how to give love. I breathed a prayer hoping it would stay true and I believed he was right.
Living in community has stretched me in ways I didn't even know were possible. It's like working out for the first time and stretching afterwards and being like, "Ouch! I didn't even know that there was a muscle there that could be used!" The stretching is painful but there is such a satisfying feeling being flexible.
That's pretty much how my spirit feels. There are times I want to run and never address my feelings again or the person that evoked the emotions in me. Obviously, I can't do that:
1. Because I love Jesus.
2. Because the person would never let me off the hook and I wouldn't let myself off the hook because I just stinkin love them so much.
3. Bitterness is the disease I curse on my brother and I eventually die of.
Two nights ago I ran up the stairs to my room ready to dump my backpack on the floor, throw my shoes across the room and just crash onto my bed and sleep. Instead I went into the bathroom and just stared into space for a good half an hour. 3 things I knew:
1. I was mad and didn't know why.
2. I had been mad for quite a while now and been burying it.
3. I was done being mad and ready to just be joyful again.
Jesus met me in that frustrated moment and told me why we had been blocked from each other for a few weeks.
"Connie, dear heart, you are holding bitterness against 5 people. You are not extending grace and you are looking at them in an old mindset. You see them for what they used to be and not as I see them. If you really cared for them to walk in freedom you would not be consumed with how they make YOU feel but it would matter to you more how THEY feel loved and free. So you would pray and speak life and blessing over them and not carry thoughts of self-righteousness and bitterness towards their behavior. That's why you have felt far from Me and why we cannot connect. You have responded in pride in reaction to their pride. Sin in reaction to sin does not sow love. You have been offered love. Do not reject it now. I love you so much! Give to them what I have given to you."
I sighed deeply as God named to me the 5 people I was unnerved by. I was relieved to hear His voice. And I was upset by my actions. I had not been walking in love. I remembered how that man at my graduation spoke of how I walked in love. Now, I was humbled because I realized I haven't even gotten close to understanding how to walk in that way. It was all before I lived in this community.
I washed myself off after God spoke to me and I prayed He would do the same thing inside of me. (Something about a physical cleanse seems to always make me feel better) I asked Him to search my heart and He had been faithful to point out the wrong thing within me. I felt tired but so unburdened knowing now I could crawl in His lap with nothing to hold me back.
Community does something to you. It reveals the beautiful and ugliest places of your being and it shines a spotlight on the you Jesus intended you to be. Jesus uses community to point out the sin and point out the God given gifts we carry. I know now that I have gained knowledge and can't have any excuses of carrying ignorance.
Jesus intended us to live in community. For accountability. For iron sharpening iron. He knows that He gave you something that I need and He gave me something you need. And I would not have seen how much love I was missing out on if I had not been in community. I had to see the restrain within myself to break pride,
so I can love a little bit more like Jesus does.
