Love Does Not Delight in Evil, But Rejoices With the Truth.

Have you ever taken delight in evil? How terrible does that sound? What kind and gentle Christian person would delight themselves in evil things? I was convinced that I had never done such a hurtful and horrible thing. But through this Love study, God has taught me so much and yet again, he was going to teach me something new to knock me off my feet and put me face down in humility.

I am well aware that I am far from perfect and I will be the first to admit it. I am not naive to the fact that I have on several occasions been blinded by my own pride and down right terrible behavior. I have thought that my actions were justifiable at the time or that I might have had the “right” to feel the way I did in a certain situation. But have I ever taken delight in evil? Still convinced of my innocence, my flesh wasn’t going to give that one up so easily.

Delight: A feeling of extreme gratification aroused by something good or desired.
Evil: Something that is a cause or source of suffering, injury, or destruction: the social evils of poverty and injustice.

WHAT THE... Again, Father God has brought me to my knees in conviction and has drawn out a covered up sin that I have chosen to bury. Though I do not feel that I have deliberately delighted in evil, God reminds me of several times of when I have taken the stance or a feeling that a person has deserved their suffering because of the hurt they have caused me or others.

For me, my hurt over the affair has caused me to rudely point the finger and say "you deserve what you get!" Deserve all the hurt, all the pain and at times I wish it was worse for you... just so you could feel the pain that I felt and what you took away from me. How stupid am I to admit that? Have I learned nothing from this recent conviction? Don't paint me as a vengeful person yet; remember I am still working through the hurt and moving on towards healing. And though I am still angry, I am convicted and question, who I am to judge whether or not their pain hasn't been as bad as mine. Or simply the fact, "Who am I to be OK with the suffering of someone else?!?!" WHO?!?!

More often than not the hurt that is there is just the enemy covering our eyes to the freedom we could have if we just gave it up. Instead we allow the enemy to stay and feed our pain and hide behind all our selfish reasoning. In the end, living in hurt and bitterness will only hurt us. We can all at times find ourselves delighting in evil, usually and unfortunately unaware of it. It can be as small as saying, “See, I told you so.” Or not even the words crossing your lips, but taking a prideful stance that you sure did warn them.

What God calls us to do is love one another and rejoice in the truth. John 3:21 “But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God." Let us not hold ourselves as better than any one else. To God, all our sins are the same. Who are we to delight in any hurt or suffering of others, even if we feel that it is justifiable? Would you want others to delight in your suffering?

In this walk, I have come so very far. Yet, there is still so much more for me to learn and walk through. I don’t think there is ever a point in someone’s life that they should stop growing and learning. All through life God allows things to happen to make us better, stronger people and to show us how faithful and amazing He is as our Father. I can rejoice in that truth alone.

Have you ever unintentionally found yourself being 'OK' with another person's hurt or suffering? What is God putting on your heart?

Love Keeps No Record of Wrongs

I’m stunned; no, shocked how I pretty much fail at each of the types of love that God commands us to walk in. I felt like I would be good at one of these love commands, but each one goes deeper, to the most inner parts of my soul, and shows me how much I really suck at loving. I am beginning to realize how selfish an unloving I can be toward especially towards the people I care about most. It’s funny in a way, because sometimes the people you are closest to are the ones you end up whacking the hardest with your insensitivity.

Those who know me well can attest that I never forget anything. I have a mind like an elephant, so they say, and I can list every hurtful thing you’ve ever done to me. I know what you must be thinking, who would want to live like that?! Trust me when I say, I have NO FREAKING clue because I hate to remember things!! You did something to me 5 years ago and I’ll be able to name what you did and even how you said it, to hurt my feelings. I unfortunately really do NOT walk in keeping no records of wrong.

I seem to always remember both the big and little things that felt like a jab at who I am as a person. I sure wish I could forget the time in 6th grade when a bunch of 8th graders made fun of my clothes and shoes and said that I dressed like a penguin, since at the time I wore white shirts and black 80’s jeans all the time. What I was thinking in wearing that? I don’t know, it doesn’t really matter… but I can’t seem to forget the hurt it caused; since then I’ve never worn black jeans again. I can remember situations with a long distance relative that still get me annoyed, making it difficult to speak to them, even to this day. I can remember everyone in my youth group being mad at me for no good reason because the “popular “ girl said I wasn’t cool enough and how it made me feel so alone. I can remember the first time I met my sister-in-love and how we both gave dirty looks to one another; or how my other sister-in-law punched me because she was so mad. But the worst thing I keep record of is my husband’s infidelity. I want nothing more than to let it go and let us live our lives as new. But I still have a tendency to bring this “wrong” back on record and not love him as Jesus tells me to.

Digging deeper I realized this verse has a few different translations; whether you see it as no record of wrongs (NIV), love is not resentful (RSV) or look at it as simply that love holds no grudges (LB), I’m sure that we can all recall something we’ve held against someone and continued to reminded them of their failures. For me, I need to let the little things go and release the people that have repented free of this “judgment” that I have placed upon them. I must not bring up past failures and live in today and the promises that God gives us each day. Switchfoot has a song, “Dare You to Move,” that hits the nail on the head regarding this very thing. Moving on and living life as though the hurts of yesterday never happened. God, dare me to move!

Switchfoot - dare you to move
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Love is not Easily Angered

It’s funny because as I sat down to start writing this, I must confess that I AM a little angry. I find it odd that I feel led to write this now; but then again God always shows me something through this. Obviously He is trying to tell me something, right? It never ceases to amaze me on what I keep learning about this verse on love. As I start to examine my relationships, my marriage, my close friendships and even myself as a new mother I realize how often I fall short. Thankfully we have a truly loving and most redeeming savior!

The word anger is defined as “A strong feeling of displeasure or hostility.” Boy-oh-boy do I feel that way a lot; thank God Paul didn’t leave out that amazing little word “easily” angered. Easily meaning: the petty crap that REALLY means nothing in the long run that we all get annoyed or frustrated over. I for one find myself doing this a lot!!!

Ephesians 4:26-27, 31-32 says, “Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on the cause of your anger. Do not give the devil an opportunity. You must put away every kind of bitterness, anger, wrath, quarreling, and evil, slanderous talk. And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you”

Let me lay it out for you in 2009 lingo. There are times for anger for a just cause, but make sure to talk about it right away and don’t let it fester inside. Don’t give the devil the opportunity to make things worse. You must not hold onto resenting bitterness, petty anger; selfish quarreling, and all that, “Oh no she didn’t” talk. {snap, snap, snap} And always be kind and tender hearted to one another, and remember that because we are forgiven every day by our God we must extend grace and forgive one another as well.

I don’t know about you, but I surely needed to hear that today (even though I wrote this last night and had to wait till my hubby edited it this morning)! So much of the time I find myself easily angered with my husband, but in the long run see that the issue was so petty and unnecessary. Or there are times where I find myself getting angry or hurt by others because they have bluntly called me out, and through my anger sits my pride knowing full well that the person is right and I just don’t want to admit it. So as I sit here wounded in my own pride I will leave you with one question before I run off and apologize to my hubby. Was your anger righteous today?!

Love is Not Self Seeking

Last year was a big year for me, none like I’ve ever experienced before. God was molding me, changing me, making me new and allowing me to walk through fires I never thought I would have been able able to walk through. During this time a friend challenged me to dig deep into the Word; to really examine God's promises to me and the destiny he had for my life. She asked me if I had ever really studied 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 before. I had read the verses a thousand times before, what could be any different now?

As I slowly broke down the verse into each individual phrase, I began to realize how perfect God’s love was and how imperfect I was at loving. I wanted to write down what God was showing me, so I started blogging about it. I worked my way through Love is Patient and then through Love is Kind. Then walked my way through Love Does Not Envy. The last blog post I wrote about these verses was Love Does not Boast or is Not Proud. As I dug into the Word, I found myself more and more convicted by the words of my Savior. I didn’t realize how much I failed at true love!

Though it has taken me a year to come back to it, I feel the need to finish. Which brings me to today’s topic “Love is Not Self Seeking.” Mr. Dictionary tell us that the definition of self seeking is “The act or habit of seeking one's own interest or happiness; selfishness.”

Ok… I am now going to take a brief moment to stop and R-E-A-L-L-Y think about what I’m going to say next because I really don’t want any word vomit to spew from my mouth before wisdom has had a chance to settle. Here is a cute music video of Mercy Me singing "So Long Self." How appropriate!

There are a million things I could say about this type of love and how I don’t believe that anyone but Jesus is capable of walking it out as Paul described when he wrote this verse. I believe Paul saw what selfishness could do to the world; he saw what it was doing to the world. I too have seen first hand what selfishness can do. I have seen it hurt people in ways you cannot imagine and have watched selfishness so consume people that they completely believe all the lies the enemy has fed to them. But who am I to judge; have I not been selfish in my life time? Is this really too much of Paul to be asking of us?

Can you honestly say that you have never had a selfish motive and carried it out? Or refused to do something good because you just don't feel like it? Because… I KNOW I HAVE! I am a girl that likes to be comfortable. I can’t stand confrontation, so I’ll do almost anything to avoid those situations. I love my sleep, so I’ll ask my darling husband to get up with Jayden so I can sleep in just a little bit longer! In all three of these examples I acted in selfishness!!

Unfortunately when the fall of man occurred and Adam and Eve took that bite from that fruit, (not that I’m blaming them for my actions) a lot of the “pure at heart” characteristics fell away from them. It’s a constant battle for most of us to fight the natural instinct to look out for one's self. Even Jeremiah 17:9 says that “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can understand it?” Not that people can’t be selfless, they can! There are so many in this world who will die to themselves daily and put other people’s needs before their own. But... it's still a battle! (2 Corinthians 4:11-12)

Though I still fall short and put my own selfish desires before others, I do want to be more like my Jesus everyday. Paul was right, true love isn’t self seeking. Jesus committed the most selfless act one can by giving up his life for all of humanity. He embodies what Paul was talking about in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 and I want to love like that.

Love does not Boast, and is not Proud

It’s so hard to admit when you’re wrong! In my close-minded mind, I’m always right and I will fight you tooth and nail to prove it to you. There are some people I will bend to quicker than others, but to the ones who know me best … it’s a battle to the death! And most of the time in only ends in hurt and sadness. So why do I keep doing this if it causes so much hurt?

TIME TO GET REAL AND TAKE OFF THE MASK

It’s something that I have struggle with for a long time, and hurts the relationships that I’m in. My pride just gets the better of me sometimes; I know my faults and I know how I fail, but it’s even harder to hear it from people you love.My mom always says to me “Lyryn, you can’t hear the truth.” And then I get mad at her for saying it! The reason I get so mad, is because it’s so true. Well Mom, I hear you… I get it… your only speaking truth.

As most of you know, these past few months have been super hard. And I know a big part of that has been because of this huge thing called pride and self control in my life. Why must I always have the last word? Why do I need to pick a fight about the dishes? Is it really worth all the fighting? And if I didn’t get my point across that day it would be 100 times worst the next. Life can be over whelming when you deal with this all day! And for some reason I couldn’t see or accept that I was treating people this way all because my pride stood in the way! I couldn’t even been corrected by family member about the way I talked to my husband. How in the world have I been walking in love? I haven’t, which explains a lot about where I a now.

Slowly but surly, I’m understanding the ins and outs of little old me. The truth is sometimes is really hard to hear, but how can you grow if your unwilling to hear the truth and change. And if we are unwilling to hear truth from our own family members, how are we ever going to hear truth from God. If you can’t accept what the people who love you the most are saying about you, you’re not going to be able to accept what your Father in heaven has to say? I would really encourage you to take a good look at your life and see if there is a part of you that prideful and can’t hear truth from the people who love you most, you might be surprised … I was.

Love does not Envy

And I said college was a waste of time! This, my friends, is where my year of going to Christian college pays off! Interpretation of the bible had to be one of my favorite classes. I learned so much, and I was encouraged to dig deeper into the Word to find my truth. It taught me to really look at the meanings behind the words and why the interpreters chose to use the words they did. Sometimes, it really makes me questions why they used the word they did when translating the bible. Corinthians 13 is a good reason I do.

In many translations you will read "Love is not jealous," but that just doesn't sit well in me. The word I think Paul wanted to use was "Envy," because how can love not be jealous when, after all, our God is a jealous God! (Exodus 20:5) And if love is not jealous and God is love, the Scriptures totally contradict them self. But again, it's all in the translation and who translated it. The way I see it, of course love is jealous; just like God is jealous for the heart's of His people, should a wife not be jealous for the love of her husband?

The word "Jealousy" and "Envy" are two totally different things and mean two totally different emotions. Yes, they may sound very similar, and they often are used interchangeably; but more often than not they are used incorrectly. The way I see it, the word "jealous" should not be used in this scripture at all. As Wikipedia so beautiful puts it, the word "Jealous" means to fear losing something that one possesses to another person (a loved one in the prototypical form), while the word "Envy" is the pain or frustration caused by another person having something that one does not have oneself.

I have shockingly discovered that women are the most jealous creatures on earth! I don't care who you are or where you go to church, every woman has this gene, or whatever you want to call it, burned into their being. Some may display it more than others... but it's there. For example, when women buy the most up-to-date clothing and buy the most fashionable purses, who do you think they are trying to impress? Don't think for one moment its for their husbands or significant other... we are dressing to impress other women, our girlfriends! We want our friends to think we look trendy and cute, or think how lucky she is to have hair that will go wherever she wants it to. Ok, so am I the only one?

Unless you are a woman much like my mother, who truly believes that since she is beautiful on the inside, (which she is) there's no need to worry about the outside. She is who she is and she's proud of it! But, I know at some point in her life she did care about what cloths she wore and how she did her hair. But she will always be a woman who is happy enough on the inside to not worry about what PEOPLE think of her on the outside. She is the most amazing, talented, funny, caring person I know. But she has her moments too where jealousy hits. We all have different things that make us tick or cause an emotion in us.

Jealousy has always been an issue for me. I think it's triggered by low self esteem, but I'm learning each day that God only give you what you can handle. I don't need what the other girl has down the street, who knows, maybe she wants what I have! People always want what they don't have... but maybe if we looked at it as be thankful for what you do have, we wouldn't lead such jealous lives. You never know what a person has until you know the heart of that person.

Love is Kind

You’d think that being kind would be easy; it’s not that hard to look up and just smile at a person, or ask them how their doing, right? Why is it, that people now-a-days can’t hold open a door for the person behind them or pick up something the person beside you dropped? Does anyone really know what it is to be kind anymore? Are you kind?

So what does it really mean to be kind? Using modern day technology, Dictionary.Com gives five definitions of what it is to be kind.

1. Of a friendly, generous, or warm-hearted nature.
2. Showing sympathy or understanding; charitable: a kind word.
3. Humane; considerate: kind to animals.
4. Forbearing; tolerant: Our neighbor was very kind about the window we broke.
5. Generous; liberal: kind words of praise.

For the past several days this question has been haunting me. Most of my adult life, I have been accused of being cold, grumpy, unhappy, speaking to people in a “tone;” and… I think I’m going to stop there just so I can keep what’s left of my ego. I never thought what they were saying was really true, but apparently my face was.

My place of employment was were I got most of the slack from. People would go into the HR manager and tell them that I wasn’t very nice and that they felt uncomfortable with me. This became old after the fifth time being called into Karen’s office. I thought that people were out to get me! What did I do so wrong for them to pick me out? I can sit here and name a hand full of people that don’t act very kind. There are even some that won’t even look at you when you’re talking to them. So what was it about me that they felt the need to complain to HR about?

As I really think about it now, I kind of have to laugh; they were right, I would walk through work with my head down, not smiling, and pretty much keeping to myself. In my mind, I was there for work and work alone. I didn’t come to work to socialize or befriend anyone, but the problem with that was I contradicted myself.

I was, and still am best friends and sister-in-law with the owner’s daughters. It dawned on me, and I think it was even mentioned during a situation at work, that the only reason people cared so much about how I treat them is because I was technically part of the “in” crowd, which in this case was being part of the Witmer family. For goodness sakes, I even called them mom and dad! Now, people wouldn’t just complain about me… trust me, my sister-in-law must have been called into HR about 30 times before she graduated college and went off to bigger and better ART things! It was even a running joke in the family that Katie would be called into Karen’s office in the morning.

All these employees ever wanted, was to be liked by the influential people in the company. I expected these people to be kind to me, when I wouldn't even try to be kind to them. If I was an outsider looking in, it would be hard to believe I was even a Christian. At least that's how I see it now. In no way was I being kind, and in no way was I being loving, so how could they ever see Christ in me?

Living in the world we do today, we seem to only worry about ourselves and what is going on in our own lives. We tend to walk with our heads down and not notice the person next you us. It our heads we are the priority not that poor guy on the corner, who obviously did something wrong to end up there. Come on, being kind is not that hard! And trust me, I’m telling myself that. I would have to say, the kindest person I know would have to be my soon to be sister in law, Tara. I think if Jesus was here in the flesh he would show the kind if kindness that Tara shows others. She is so in love with God and so filled with him that all she can do is be kind to others. My prayer is that someday I can be in that place where God is so vibrant in my life that all I can do is show kindness to others, and each day is a new one to try.

Love is Patient

Most of us are familiar with Corinthians 13: 4-7, love is patient, love is kind; but have you ever really looked at this verse? If you have, then you are way ahead of most people living in the United States, and I think you should write a book; because I am convinced that most people (even Christians) don’t know what it is to really love, and when I say people, I’m also including myself. Yes, it’s a good verse to read at a wedding, and maybe a good way to talk to your children about loving their siblings, but do we fully understand what Paul was trying to say here?

I thought I knew what this verse was about; for goodness sake, it was the verse God gave me when I knew that he was telling me that Jesse was my husband and vic-versa. I knew this verse was explaining the meaning of love, and what it is to love. But until now, that verse was only mere words on a page. A good friend challenged me to really take a deeper look into what each word and what they really meant, taking it one step at a time to uncover what love really is and what it is to really love.

Love is Patient – My most recent friend, the Wikipedia, explains patience to be the ability to endure waiting, delay, or provocation without becoming annoyed or upset, or to persevere calmly when faced with difficulties.

Dude, wait a minute… I totally didn’t sign up for this! First off, why would love need to endure waiting? And secondly, when I’m faced with difficulties I’m more likely to craw into bed and never come out, then face them calmly and with maturity. In my young married mind, love is patient meant that I had to wait till I was 21 to get married and that Jesse had to be patient with me. As I read that back to myself, I want someone to hit me in the head like that V8 commercial. (Bonk) But I guess that’s what you think when you’re looking at love selfishly and one-sided.

Obviously, patience is not one of my gifts, but I find myself asking for more of it lately. And by grace, He is giving it. Who better to give it, right? God will wait, and wait, and wait for us to come to him and be with him. He’s willing to wait without being annoyed and he is willing to walk through difficult times. He’s willing to hold our hearts when others have smashed it. He is willing to just sit with you and love on you even though you haven’t had the time for him. God is so patience; God is Love.

So, if I am to truly love I will sit and wait for the Lord to do his thing. Even though I want things to happen quickly and for my life to be fixed I have to be patient with the one I love. I must not let thing upset me because my battle is not against flesh. I have to be strong and keep calm when I feel like everything is crashing in on me because God will see me through. By being patient, I am loving, and by loving I’m allowing God to move.