What Love Is This?
A few weeks ago I recieved a large brown box on my doorstep. The return label didn't offer any clues to it's sender, but it's reciever was glad to see for herself what it could be! Like a kid in a candy story I tore open that box to find something far better than candy in this fashionista's mind, a purse. And not just any purse, a Micheal Kors purse. Oh, leather never smelled so good! I squeezed the vanilla color right out of it's soft leather skin, hugging it to my body and skipping around through the house like Julia Roberts on Rodeo Drive! Searching for clues as to where this bag came from, my jaw dropped as I lifted the small gift tag from it's golden straps. It was worth far more than anything this garage sale shopper has ever owned. A gift from a woman whose knowledge could only be surpassed by her unconditional love, my grandmother, Claire.
What love is this? To offer me such an extravagant gift, one that I would never be able to repay, leaving me breathless, drowning in the graciousness of her love. To know a love like that is so rare, but wonderful, reminding me what this life is all about. It is about a love that moves beyond our weaknesses and abilities, stretching to the outer most corners of our humanity, reaching beyond ourselves and into the hearts and souls of others. Only when we experience a love greater than ourselves can we believe in the God who gave it.
I say this because I know. As I've struggled to believe that I am worth loving, unable to recieve it because I couldn't believe it, I now know that God loves me, because He gave me a gift. This time it didn't come in a cardboard box, but in the form of a small child. I was hopelessly lost under countless applications. Each one became a fruitless effort to find a job that gave me purpose without stealing from my children the joys of having a stay-at-home mom. Desparate and frustrated I cried out to God daily, "Please Lord. Give me a job by November 1st!" I didn't need the job as much as I need to know that God was still there. With each passing day it seemed more and more impossible that anything would come my way. Trusting His heart and not my instincts, to run from a God who seemed to have run from me, I remained in Him hoping He would remain in me.
Today is Novemer 1st. No job, no interview, no chance that God would give me the answer to my prayer. After dropping my kids off at school I began the long drive to a dear friend's house who couldn't live in the city like a normal person ;). Christmas music blasting from my Blackberry, thanks to Pandora, I drove along hoping that nostalgic memories of Christmases long ago would lift my spirits and keep me going. At 9 am my phone rings. It's God. Actually, it was a sweet mother wanting to meet me that day (November 1st) to interview me to watch her sweet baby boy 3 days a week. But I knew it was God. At 12:30 she and her husband walked into my house carrying their precious bundle of joy! But I knew that God had showed up. At 1:30pm they walked out, but not before hugging me and telling me that I had the job! I closed the door and danced around my house like a child, a child of God. And as I layed on the carpet of my living room, stairing at the ceiling, overwhelmed and in shock this November 1st day, I thought, "What love is this?" A love that could only be my God, my Abba Father, the Beginning the Middle, and the End.
