FOOD
FOR THOUGHT
(02/15/2009)
HOW
DO I LOVE THEE?
Cindy Hong
Millions
spent billions this week to celebrate love. Flowers, cards, chocolates,
dinners, and trips. We are professional lovers, we know the ropes. Buy
this, do that. But we're also smart enough to know that celebrating and
appreciating love once a year is hardly enough. Merely filling a yearly
quota, we may find ourselves with no love to celebrate next year. In 1915,
armed with a new PhD, a Pennsylvanian sailed for the Philippines to live
with the Muslim Moros people. As a professional missionary, Frank Laubach's
legacy consisted of teaching the Moros to read and write, decreasing illiteracy
on their island by half. His legacy to the rest of us was loving God intimately
and living each moment aware of God's presence. After 15 years in the
mission field, he grew profoundly dissatisfied with his life as a professional
missionary and began practicing the presence of God in a moment-by-moment
affair. As he typed, talked, and taught, he prayed for obedience and surrender,
desiring to be lost in God's love. For us as professional Christians,
we know what the job requires. Attend church, read the Bible, do good
works, be nice, obey God. Yet what does all this really mean? Are we changed
by this? Are we more in love with God? Does He take our breath away? In
the beginning, because we couldn't move toward God on our own, God chased
us. But now, are we running after Him? Chasing Him and loving Him with
every breath as if our lives depended on it? No longer a professional
Christian but a passionate follower of Jesus, captured by and lost in
His love. Now that seems to be a love worth celebrating 24/7/365.
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