Hope Without Limits

“If you choose to live lovingly; you will be in love every day of your life.”

I’m a sucker for a “fairy tale, happy every after ending”.  I’ve spent many hours watching movies that provide exactly that.  However,  I’m beginning to realize that expectation can also be a trap.  Right about now, you may be wondering … isn’t this blog about unconditional hope?  This doesn’t sound real hopeful.  Actually there is real hope here rather than fantasy.  I know which one, I prefer – how about you?

Ask any 2 people what it means to be “in love” and most often what you hear is a description of some sort of nebulous, wonderful feeling that is a fragile gift and state of existence in the sense that it depends on circumstances and other’s responses in order to continue to exist.

Do you know what we do to our hearts when we believe that what would truly make us happy is a fairy tale and unachievable in the “real world”?  We set up ourselves to give the enemy access to our lives to make that a self-fulling prophecy.

Let me ask you a couple of questions – are you perfect?  Are the people around you perfect? I’m thinking that’s a “double no” for answers.  And, actually there is freedom in that.  What am I talking about?

How many times have you beat yourself for not being perfect?  How many times has your heart been wounded because you expected the people you love to be perfect and …. oooops …. perfection eluded them as well?

Back to my original thought:

 “If you choose to live lovingly; you will be in love every day of your life.”

I had actually forgotten about this revelation which My Heavenly Father downloaded to me over a year ago, but this weekend He led me to look up a specific date in my journal and there it was.  It took my breath away as much today as it did the moment I first heard it.

Being transparent, I don’t think this is any coincidence since my husband just asked me the other night “how can you spend time watching that stuff” as in the acting is so bad and the story so unbelievable.   At first I felt defensive (surprise, surprise 🙂 ) I so wanted to and did rationalize that life is hard and I just want/ need to escape to where there is a happy ending.  He told me he just didn’t get it how I could be so intelligent and invest my time that way.   He can be most annoying when he makes valid points like that 🙂

When I sat down for some just one-on-one time with Father God the first thing I heard was “Maybe he’s right”.  Seriously God?  You too?  What’s so wrong with wanting a happy ending?  The answer … nothing!  That’s the whole reason Jesus came, to provide the happy ending for which we all long from deep within us.  Do you see it?  Boy (Jesus) seeks out “the girl of his dream” (the Bride of Christ); pursues her; fights for her; rescues her; provides for her; protects her; and, makes it possible for them to live happily ever after for eternity.  While he is doing all of this,  she love’s him with all her heart, co-laboring with him for his kingdom to reign.  It’s an eternal desire that resides in each of us for a reason … because it resides in the heart of our Heavenly Father.

It’s just that our Heavenly Father wants us to realize we don’t have to wait for “some day”.  It’s available today, now.  Hmmmmm …. I’m thinking that’s better than an unattainable fairy tale!

How do we live lovingly so that we can literally be in love every day of our lives?

• It’s a choice we have in every moment to receive our Heavenly Father’s love for us extended to us every moment:

The Lord appeared from of old to me [Israel], saying,
Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love;
therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn you
and continued My faithfulness to you
Jeremiah 31:3

• It’s a choice to come into agreement with the truth of His love for us, how He sees us, and to reject the self-hatred, condemnation and judgment we are so quick to agree with towards ourselves:

• It’s a choice to extend this same unconditional love we have received to those around us.  That’s grace.  A few years ago I listened to a teaching by James Ryle that changed my whole perspective about grace being “unmerited favor”.   That has always sounded so clinical and cold to me; like God is putting up with us.  James Ryle explained the Greek root word for grace is the same word for delight and a more literal translation of grace is – out of God’s delight in each of us He chooses to extend favor rather than to take offense at our sins.  You know how “love is blind” in all those fairy tales …. this is real love that knows everything about us, more than we know ourselves, and still His desire is to extend His favor to us out of His delight in us.

He reached down from on high and took hold of me;
he drew me out of deep waters.
He rescued me from my powerful enemy,
from my foes, who were too strong for me.
They confronted me in the day of my disaster,
but the Lord was my support.
He brought me out into a spacious place;
he rescued me because he delighted in me.
(Psalm 18:16-19)

• And, as we live in agreement with our Heavenly Father’s love that endures forever:

O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;
for His mercy and loving-kindness endure forever!
(Psalm 107:1) 

• To be so filled up by and permeated by that love it over flows to everyone around us – spouses, family, friends, co-workers, strangers.

May He grant you out of the rich treasury of His glory
to be strengthened and reinforced
with mighty power in the inner man
by the [Holy] Spirit [Himself indwelling your innermost being and personality].
May Christ through your faith [actually] dwell
(settle down, abide, make His permanent home) in your hearts!
May you be rooted deep in love and founded securely on love,
That you may have the power
and be strong to apprehend and grasp with all the saints
[God’s devoted people, the experience of that love]
what is the breadth and length and height and depth [of it];
[That you may really come] to know
[practically, through experience for yourselves]
the love of Christ, which far surpasses
mere knowledge [without experience];
that you may be filled [through all your being]
unto all the fullness of God
[may have the richest measure of the divine Presence,
and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!
Ephesians 3:16-19 Amplified

Now that’s really being “in love”.  Living in the midst of love every moment of every day and it doesn’t depend on circumstances or the responses of others.  We’re talking “the real thing” not some fairy tale.

Care to partake?