"If you love Me, be my hands."

"I asked the Lord to help my neighbor,

And to carry the gospel to distant lands,

And to comfort the sick, but He said to me,

If you love me, be my hands.

I asked the Lord to go to the dying,

And the orphan in the street,

And visit the prisoner, but He said to me,

If you love me, be my feet.

I asked the Lord to look to the poor,

And watch over each babe that cries,

And see each man's need, but He said to me,

If you love me, be my eyes.

I said to the Lord, I want to serve You,

But I don't know where to start.

To love is the answer, He said to me.

If you love me, be my heart."

~G. Shirie Westfall

(Taken from "Extreme Devotion", pg. 252)

  I've been seeking God alot the past while.  He hasn't let me seek in vain; I'm finding my life turned upside-down in more than one area.  I don't like it; it's not comfortable, or nice, and at times it doesn't feel very hopeful, either.  God has a way of pulling me away from my comfort zone, and leaving me with nothing to grasp (I'm the kind of person who has to have something to cling to, always) - besides for Himself.  

  But that's the way I've been living.  And when I go to God and tell Him just what I'm feeling, without fail, He brings something - or someone - or a song - or a poem - or something like that, into my life.  And it's like looking up to Mt. Everest and thirsting to climb that height, knowing that I've got to climb it - and yet knowing that puny little me doesn't have the strength to do it.  Challenged to the core, but without the strength in myself to rise to the challenge.

  It's just as if I could hear Christ's voice, every time.  It's not MY ability, or lack of ability, that matters. It's all dependent on His strength.  And that's exactly why I CAN reach that height! What sweet freedom!

  I like that verse in Job: "For He will complete what He appoints for me, and many such things are in His mind."  

  So ... one of the biggest things God is challenging my my heart with, is the mountain of love.  Loving people.  People in my circle; people I interact with on a daily basis. People with problems.  People who frustrate me or clash with my personality; people that maybe are just plain wrong.  People who I feel like are missing the point of life. It seems that everywhere I turn, there they are - those people with those problems. :) And they're bothering me.  And I don't feel like loving them.  They're wrong, after all!

  Ouch.  Is it just me, or did I see myself in that person?  In that annoying personality quirk - isn't that just what I am, inside?  How humbling to see your own fault, mirrored in the person that you really struggle to love!

  

  I found the poem that I copied at the beginning of this post, and it struck home with alot of what God has been challenging my heart with.  Is the reason His hands and feet are failing to reach the world a result of our failing to love?  Does our failure to love each other possibly reach out to the world - and the judgment we judge each other with, begins to overflow to people desperately in need of what we hold?  I think it does.  I know it does.  

  So, I read that little poem, and asked God to give me love.  Unreasonable love.  For my fellow soldiers in Christ, and for the world around me.  I want to be His hands and His feet on this earth.  Jesus wasn't afraid or threatened by other people.  He didn't fear the world.  He loved ... and whoever abides in love abides in God.  

  And just a side-note: the word love is mentioned approx. 180 times in the New Testament alone.