All You Need is Love

So originally, when I had first wanted to start this blog, I had a post that was just general information about me that I wanted to be my first post. Makes since right? Well anyway, life got in the way and I just never got around to posting it. I finished it up tonight and I will be posting it soon, maybe tomorrow. But tonight, as I drove my daughter home from my parents house I started thinking about my day and the things I had talked about with a few close friends, and all the unfortunate dark things that are going on in the world and I kind of had a revelation.

Everyone is aware of the hate and the death that has been plaguing the country, well really the world, I feel like most prevalent within the last year. Black Live Matter, All Lives Matter, Blue Lives Matter. I'm not here to tell you where I stand or what side "I'm on" because the truth of the matter is I'm not on any side in particular. I'm on the side of Love. Love Matters. That is all that matters. Do you hear me? I will repeat it again LOVE is all that matters. I am not here to belittle your feels or to say you are wrong because honestly, what ever you are feeling, they are your feelings and they are valid. What it comes down to for me is this, as a Christian even if you are not one, we all have a symbolic "cross" to bare like our Savior did for us. The cross you might bare is, you grew up in a corrupt inner city and never felt like you were give equal opportunity to excel because of you economical situation or the color of your skin. Your cross may make you worry about your own children and if they will be able to break the cycle or if they will be stuck in the same situation as you for the rest of their lives, despite you giving them every opportunity you know how. That is YOUR cross to bare. I will not tell you it's not as heavy as mine, I will not tell you to suck it up, I will not tell you it doesn't matter. Because it is the cross that you bare and I promise to never tell you otherwise. The cross you might bare is a badge. A badge that you put on everyday because all you've ever wanted to do since you where a little boy or girl was protect the ones you love. The cross you bare may feel at times so heavy from the pain of a lost brother or sister in the line of duty, or when a random person spits on you and calls you a pig for doing your job the best you know how. The cross you bare could feel so heavy some nights because you don't know if that's the last time you will read your daughter her favorite bedtime story. Your cross is just as EQUALLY important and heavy to bare. I will not tell you it's not heavy, I will not judge you by the cross you bare. You see some of us may feel at times, our crosses are a little heavier to carry than others, but everybody's pain is relevant and valid to them. But the weight of those crosses combined will never amount to the weight of that cross Jesus bared for us simply because he loved each and everyone of us, whether we know him or not, unconditionally.

We all act out of anger, hurt and selfishness at times. I will be the first to admit that sometimes I am quick to those feelings. And the truth is sometimes you need a little selfish times. It's wrong yes, but that is what conviction is for, to set us right. The other people in our lives and in our communities will have the same issues, and you will have to bare these things too. Learn to forgive those who speak out of anger and hurt. Learn how to be compassionate, and give grace even if you feel it isn't deserve or warranted. Simple because Christ gave it to you. Before you were even born, and before you had ever made a mistake in your life.

So when you read something that makes you angry, or you feel like arguing "your side", take a deep breath and try to respond with grace and compassion for the other person's cross. Because after all, know matter what "side" you're on, we're all on the same side to Christ. Brothers and Sisters. I think if we start to act like them and start treating each other with LOVE first. We might just be able to be the light in the darkness. I leave you tonight with my favorite verse of all time.

1 Corinthians 13New Living Translation (NLT)

13 If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;[a] but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages[b] and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.[c] All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.