In The Beginning...

I decided to start off my blogging career (or something like that) with one of my favorite passages from God's Word.

1 John 4:7-21 ( (NIV)


God's Love and Ours
7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son[a] into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for[b] our sins. 11Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

13We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. 14And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. 16And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. 17In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. 18There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.


This is something that I've been meditating upon a lot lately.   This is probably because, to be very honest, I struggle with hating Longview.  The old adage of a love-hate relationship is how I would describe my feelings about this town.  It has gotten better over the past year, but it's still hard.  I'm trying to move on by making a life here, though I think a root canal would be less painful.  But no pain, no gain, right?  What breaks you makes you stronger?  Why do these spurring words bring no comfort, nor encouragement?  Who but God knows ?! Sometimes we are just require to obey only to learn later the why, or sometimes we never find out.  Can you tell I've read through Job lately? :)  Though this makes me think perhaps the why is just so that we will have something to talk to God about in eternity.  Ha, ha...maybe so, maybe no!

Another aspect of this struggle, I believe, is the fact that the process of learning to be truly content where you're at is all about trusting God.  Yes, I do realize this isn't the most profound thing I've ever thought, but it is fundamental, as well as something that is often forgotten.  God gave me a passage almost 7 years ago.  Strangely enough it was a verse a girl in 8th grade showed me when I first became a Christian.  She wasn't one of my friends, just a girl in my math/science class.  She said, "Here, lemme see your Bible.  This is my favorite passage...Psalm 91."  I remember reading it and thinking, 'What in the world does that mean?'"  After God brought it to my attention 7 years ago I was lucky enough to have a study Bible, so I got it a little more this time around. 
It's a picture of trust, and what God is able to do in a trusting 
relationship.

So, as I start this blogging endeavor I thought it would be best to set my mind to express the meditations of my heart since I don't really have someone to share such thoughts with,
as well as the mere fact that I rarely get to show my pensive side to those I do know.  The life
of a nervous, socially awkward person, eh?