rehab: resounding gongs.

I wonder what it means to "believe for" something.

I'm thinking about my Dad.

This faith thing has been interesting for me, because all of the things that had already been neatly dealt with in therapy, and tucked away, and cleaned--they're coming back around. Therapists don't care if you really forgive people in your heart. Jesus seems to.

Of all of the things I've learned from Tim Keene that he probably has no idea he taught me, it's that love is what Paul says it is. We were talking one day, and I said that a person was probably "that kind of person." Tim gently reminded me. Love doesn't keep records, and it always trusts, and it always hopes.

That means it doesn't expect you to screw up, it doesn't remember that you screwed up so many times before, it wholly and openly and miraculously believes that you'll be all that God made you to be. What an incredible gift to give someone. What an unbelievable thing to receive--that kind of love.

I've read over those verses so many times, thinking, "how pretty." But really-- how powerful. And how monstrously difficult. To love that way, without memory for wrongs, and with full and innocent trust in a person's ability to change and grow, it's dangerous. Pain awaits.

I had learned how to face and cope with the pain in my own story. I let go of what had happened, and decided to live forward with my parents. Our relationships improved.

But, as I wrote a few days back, God's love is so deep, so thorough, that to believe it, you really gotta believe it. The reality of His love is SO real that it will lay bare all of the cracks and the crevices of your heart. If you've been leaking, you'll know it soon.

As I travel with God, and I learn to let Him love me, my cracks are showing. The places where my love has been far less than perfect are leaking. Probably because though I had learned to cope, and to forgive, in a sense, I hadn't learned to love like God loves. Without records, and with trust and hope. Believing for that person's ability to be all that God intended. In my own ability, to be all that He intended.

I sometimes wonder what it would be like to love everyone like I'm supposed to love them at weddings. With patience, and kindness. Without envy, boastfulness or pride. Dishonoring no one, and entirely selflessly. Calmly, and with no sense of past wrongs. Truthfully, trustingly, hopefully. What if I loved my parents like that? Who could we become, if allowed out of their past mistakes? What could my friends achieve, if I loved them in the full light of their glorious identities in Christ? The receptionist? The girl who sits next to me in class? My students?

Maybe it sounds silly. But I know it's real. Tim loves people like that, and when we're talking, I know that I can be all that Christ intended--I know that I can believe for massive things, that I can trust God for miracles, that I can be holy, and loving, and brave. It's real.

As with all else, I've no faith in my own ability to love like that.

Father. Love me, that I might love others so entirely. Let me love past my expectations. You give such incredible grace. Help me to give that kind of grace. Father, give me the strength to expect the best in those around me, and in so doing, to allow them to grow into the full and incredible people You know them as. Heal my heart, so that my love will bring hearts to You for healing. Let me see people with the tenderness You have. Soften me. Give me patience. Give me all that I'm not wise enough to ask for. You're so good...