Thursday, August 24

Love Life


Tricky title,eh? Guess if you are reading this you thought I was gonna write about my "love life" - no way! This is better; this is a tale of falling in love with life itself again and again..like Jeff Lucas says "to make every day a life adventure", to re-discover the little joys that make the whole journey worth it, and to love the "piece of Kingdom" God has put you upon so much that you will do your outmost to see it transformed for the better.
Ever since we came back from Kenya three weeks ago, I can't avoid the impression that the beauty of the land we walked upon, the friendliness of the ever smiling faces we encountered and the huge contraddictions we witnessed has laid upon my soul.
The antagonism between poverty and wealth, beauty and exploitation, plenty and need it's blatant and it makes you sad, then tearful, then angry and then it's your call: either you turn your back, go home and forget about it or you seek to make that emotion shape not just your memories, but also your course of action with regards to the way you conduct your life in the "world" you live in.
I am reminded of Dennis, one of the locals we worked with. It was not only his gentleness, humility, wisdom and sophistication which impressed us, but above all it was his undeniable and fierce love for Kenya and its people. No compromise there:God loves Kenya, so does Dennis..with a true passion which is not mere "good-wishing" but transforming energy at work.
An epiphany of God's own heart, the realization of what really matters and a lot of compassion: that's what I need. I need to wake up every morning..any kind of morning and enthusiastically love the land I walk upon and live every day with contageous passion. Love life in all its fullness!

Wednesday, August 23

Cutest Advert Ever

The Greatest Thing You'll Ever Learn is to Love and to Be Loved in Return

This is an old blog I published on MSN in the summer,but I kinda thought it was worth sharing.
I am sure somebody more intellectually challenging than the director of "Moulin Rouge" wrote these wonderful words...Whichever way, I am reminded of these words and of a wee argument I had with my best friend at Bible College. He had just got engaged and argued that the greatest feeling of all is to love someone with every part of yourself and to know that that love is reciprocated in the same way. At the time my super spiritual, "holy-er than-thou" attitude made me say that the greatest thing of all is to merely love, unconditionally, without expecting anything in return... but is that true?! Don't really think so. God has created us to cherish us with His totally awesome, unconditional love, true. See creation, observe the cross.. On the other hand, though he has also enabled us to be love givers and love recepients, desperate to love and to be loved.. and now more than ever I know that. Just a thought..




Anyway, I leave you with a statuary Evan McGregor delivering a more than acceptable interpretation of "My Song" by Elton John (1971, I believe)

Monday, August 21

“Jealousy is that pain which a woman feels from the apprehension that she is not equally beloved by the person whom she entirely loves”


"Jealousy is that pain which a man feels from the apprehension that he is not equally beloved by the person whom he entirely loves", Joseph Addison

A gaze from another woman, a smile too many, shared interest with someone other than me and that feeling which nobody else seem to be able to perceive which indeed makes me feel, as Przybyszewski wrote, mad inside, unable to concentrate and worse than that, incapable of loving. Francois de la Rochedoucauld said "in jealousy there is more of self-love than love"..and this is so not what God has called us to, right?
Jealousy is theologically wrong as Jesus invited us to love selflessly and the "jealous God" the Old Testament talks about in the Hebrew actually indicates "passionate, steadfast love" - in other word as God is "mad about us" so Jesus indicates we should learn to love the world. However, jealousy is not merely theologically incorrect, but it is also making such a mess of my relationship with the person I wanna love the most. By wanting to stop him from exploring life, I am actually depriving myself of sharing in the joy that comes from us both being personally fulfilled and intellectually challenged, thus to be enriched in our inner being. SO, let's just get a grip and keep on loving with no fear - because "perfect love casts away all fears!" Amen.

Ivonnexx

Exodus 34:14; 2 Cor. 11:2 -12:20; James 4; Gal. 5.