Seeking love
Is a desperate cry
It leaves me wholeless, empty, and wanting
I seek it and seek it
Until my heart is hurting
My soul is hungry
My mind is wild
My emotions are senseless
My being is despondent
I seek love in approval
Approval lasts for a time
It satisfies until it’s forgotten
When the approval does not come
It leaves me wholeless, empty, and wanting
So, I seek love again
I seek it and seek it
Until my heart is throbbing
My soul is famished
My mind is unruly
My emotions are irrational
My being is downcast
I seek love in accomplishments
Accomplishments last for a moment
It gratifies until it’s obscured
When success is stripped away
It leaves me wholeless, empty, and wanting
So, I seek love again
I seek it and seek it
Until my heart is stinging
My soul is starving
My mind is disorderly
My emotions are vain
My being is dejected
I seek love in purpose
Purpose lasts for an era
It energizes until it’s fruitless
When the need is no longer crucial
It leaves me wholeless, empty, and wanting
So, I seek love again
I seek it and seek it
Until my heart is disappointed
My soul is lifeless
My mind is drained
My emotions are stale
My being is decayed
I seek love in people
People last until they change
They love with self-interest
When the self-interest is no longer pleasing
It leaves me wholeless, empty, and wanting
So, I seek love again
I seek it and seek it
Until my heart is aching
My soul is yearning
My mind is unwise
My emotions are erratic
My being is wretched
Then
I seek love in the eternal
I uncover it in the everlasting
He never fails me, judges me, or uses me
He just loves me for me, just me, only me
His love has no hidden agenda
He is altruistic
He desires me, accepts me, comforts me
His love, God's Love, is unpolluted
He just loves me, for me, just me, only me
When all is wholeless, empty, and wanting
The love of God
Is sufficient, satisfying, and seamless
He loves with spotless assurance
He just loves me for me, just me, only me
So, I seek Him again
I seek Him and seek Him
Until my heart is healed
My soul is filled
My mind is surrendered
My emotions are useful
My being is at peace
Then I discover
I love Him
Our union becomes organic
I find that I need no other
I need Him, for Him, just Him, only Him
Monday, May 23, 2011
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
A Mother Who Never Birthed a Child, Yet Birthed a Family for God.
Mother Teresa, a woman of great courage and strength, followed God’s leading by being the pencil that He used to write a life poured out for the hurting and the poor.
Mother Teresa grew up in a church going home. She was one of five children in which only three survived. Her family was well off financially. Being a peasant was not her experience growing up, yet the poor would be her calling and her passion later in life.
When she was a young girl, she was fascinated with missionaries and their stories. She loved to share about the missions and the service missionaries were doing. At 18 years of age, she decided to follow the missionary path that was obviously developing in her life. God used her love for missions to bring His love to the desponded, discarded, and disheartened.
As a small, quiet, shy and ordinary young woman, Mother Teresa was strong and independent. At 18, she left her mother to begin her religious life in Ireland. As a result, she never saw her mother again. She was sent with the Sisters of Loreto to Darjeeling. She made her vows there and actually changed her original name, Gonxha, to Teresa in honor of Theresa of Avila. She was then sent to St. Mary’s, a high school for girls in the district of Calcutta.
Mother Teresa never lost sight of God’s direction for her life. She ended up leaving the school to go and serve the poor in the streets. She chose to be poor with the poor in order to reach the poor for Jesus. Her life was a clear example of what Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 9:17: She went to the weak- became like the weak- so that she could win the weak.
A woman of great ingenuity, she taught the children in the slums using sticks and dirt. She didn’t have all the proper equipment, but instead was resourceful with what God gave her to teach the children to be literate. Also very important to her was teaching children how to care for themselves through basic hygiene. As each child grew in their relationship with her, they loved her. They would crowd around her telling her of their needs. She gathered with them in such squalid shacks to serve them. However, neither the stench, nor the squalor gave her mind, for she was more concerned about their hearts, their souls, and their needs. She loved the people as a mother loves her own children.
It didn’t take long before more people began to help her in this venture. So much help came that it was as if people were simply waiting for her to come along. Love and compassion gave birth: food, clothing, use of buildings, medical supplies and money poured in by the hand of God through the hands of people. This was truly the will of God at work right before the eyes of humanity!
It took faith, love and perseverance to serve the people in Calcutta. “New vocations found its beginning from all parts of the world: Homes for the dying, refuges for the care, education for orphans and abandoned children, treatment centers and hospitals for those suffering from leprosy, centers and refuges for alcoholics, the aged and street people.”*
While Mother Teresa passed away in 1997, her example still lives. She truly was the pencil that God used to write not only her own life story but one that we can all follow. Mother Teresa showed the love of Jesus to the people of Calcutta. Jesus said, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me….I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” Matthew 25:35-39
All hurting people need to be loved just as Mother Teresa loved the people of Calcutta. She never birthed a child, yet through her humble service she birthed a family of God for the Lord. Like Mother Teresa loved these, we can love others in the same way. After all, isn’t that what Jesus meant in Matthew 25:35-39: when we love people, we love Jesus. When Mother Teresa looked at each person, she saw each one as Jesus in disguise. Will we be able to see each hurting, hungry and humble person with the same eyes?
*quoted from book excerpt A Retreat With Mother Teresa and Damien of Molokai: Caring for Those Who Suffer, by Joan Guntzelman
Mother Teresa grew up in a church going home. She was one of five children in which only three survived. Her family was well off financially. Being a peasant was not her experience growing up, yet the poor would be her calling and her passion later in life.
When she was a young girl, she was fascinated with missionaries and their stories. She loved to share about the missions and the service missionaries were doing. At 18 years of age, she decided to follow the missionary path that was obviously developing in her life. God used her love for missions to bring His love to the desponded, discarded, and disheartened.
As a small, quiet, shy and ordinary young woman, Mother Teresa was strong and independent. At 18, she left her mother to begin her religious life in Ireland. As a result, she never saw her mother again. She was sent with the Sisters of Loreto to Darjeeling. She made her vows there and actually changed her original name, Gonxha, to Teresa in honor of Theresa of Avila. She was then sent to St. Mary’s, a high school for girls in the district of Calcutta.
Mother Teresa never lost sight of God’s direction for her life. She ended up leaving the school to go and serve the poor in the streets. She chose to be poor with the poor in order to reach the poor for Jesus. Her life was a clear example of what Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 9:17: She went to the weak- became like the weak- so that she could win the weak.
A woman of great ingenuity, she taught the children in the slums using sticks and dirt. She didn’t have all the proper equipment, but instead was resourceful with what God gave her to teach the children to be literate. Also very important to her was teaching children how to care for themselves through basic hygiene. As each child grew in their relationship with her, they loved her. They would crowd around her telling her of their needs. She gathered with them in such squalid shacks to serve them. However, neither the stench, nor the squalor gave her mind, for she was more concerned about their hearts, their souls, and their needs. She loved the people as a mother loves her own children.
It didn’t take long before more people began to help her in this venture. So much help came that it was as if people were simply waiting for her to come along. Love and compassion gave birth: food, clothing, use of buildings, medical supplies and money poured in by the hand of God through the hands of people. This was truly the will of God at work right before the eyes of humanity!
It took faith, love and perseverance to serve the people in Calcutta. “New vocations found its beginning from all parts of the world: Homes for the dying, refuges for the care, education for orphans and abandoned children, treatment centers and hospitals for those suffering from leprosy, centers and refuges for alcoholics, the aged and street people.”*
While Mother Teresa passed away in 1997, her example still lives. She truly was the pencil that God used to write not only her own life story but one that we can all follow. Mother Teresa showed the love of Jesus to the people of Calcutta. Jesus said, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me….I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” Matthew 25:35-39
All hurting people need to be loved just as Mother Teresa loved the people of Calcutta. She never birthed a child, yet through her humble service she birthed a family of God for the Lord. Like Mother Teresa loved these, we can love others in the same way. After all, isn’t that what Jesus meant in Matthew 25:35-39: when we love people, we love Jesus. When Mother Teresa looked at each person, she saw each one as Jesus in disguise. Will we be able to see each hurting, hungry and humble person with the same eyes?
*quoted from book excerpt A Retreat With Mother Teresa and Damien of Molokai: Caring for Those Who Suffer, by Joan Guntzelman
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