I mentioned that I finished reading Crazy Love a while back. As I flipped back through the book to decide what I wanted to share, I noticed I had underlined A LOT. If you haven't already read it, I recommend reading it for yourself. For now, I'm going to just write about some of the things that really stood out to me.
I should preface all of this by reminding you (as if most of you don't already know) that I am a deep-thinker. I love details ~ the more the better. I want answers. A nice, neat explanation is just fine and dandy with me. Black and white please with no need for any gray areas. Well....when Daddy died my mind went to a whole new level of searching for exacts. I want to know exactly where he is right now, what he's doing, what brand of tobacco he's chewing, and the list goes on and on. Often, my mind starts the familiar wondering and eventually I come back around to the realization that I can't have all of the answers. I trust what the Bible says and one day I will know but not yet.
"God is so much bigger, so far beyond our time-encased, air/food/sleep-dependent lives." As the book describes all of our questioning of Him and all of the "whys" it answers, "Because He's God. As much as we want God to explain Himself to us, His creation, we are in no place to demand that He give an account to us". It goes on to say, "He cannot be contained in this world, explained by our vocabulary, or grasped by our understanding". Well, there you go.
Worry. That's another big one for me. I do think I've made some progress through the years when it comes to the amount of power I let worry have over me. However, I certainly still struggle with worry at times especially in certain areas of my life. Some of how the book describes worry wasn't all that new to me. For example, "Worry implies that we don't quite trust God is big enough, powerful enough, or loving enough to take care of what's happening in our lives." It definitely strikes a chord though when it says, "Both worry and stress reek of arrogance". The part I love most about worry is when it states, "Frankly, you need to get over yourself". I had to laugh a little since my friend Lisa and I tell each other that at times too. It feels insulting, but it's true. "To be brutally honest, it doesn't really matter what place you find yourself in right now. The point of your life is to point to Him. Whatever you are doing, God wants to be glorified, because this whole thing is His".
How in love with Jesus are we?
"How many of us would really leave our families, our jobs, our education, our friends, our connections, our familiar surroundings, and our homes if Jesus asked us to? If He showed up and said, "Follow me"? No explanation. No directions. The fact is that nothing should concern us more than our relationship with God; it's about eternity, and nothing compares with that".
I'll leave you with this:
"The critical question for our generation ~ and for every generation ~ is this; If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ was not there?"
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