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Stop. Start. Love
Stop. Stop letting IT win. Stop letting depression consume your life and strangle your thoughts. Stop letting guilt and shame make you feel heavy, lost, and confused. Stop letting your soul become darkened and deserted by the world. Stop letting the loneliness take you to places and to people you never thought you’d encounter or even connect with. Stop sending things you shouldn’t be sending, stop giving in to things you shouldn’t be apart of. Stop giving your best to those who don’t deserve it. Stop beating yourself up every day over a simple mistake you made. Stop trying to fall in love, and start looking for our Father’s love. Stop letting worry eat you alive at night. Stop living behind lies, jealousy, anger, and lust. Stop being so negative, and vulgar towards other people. Stop the hate, and start the love. Stop living for the world, and start living for Jesus.
How easy it is to start, and yet how hard it is to stop. It’s like being addicted to smoking cigarettes. Just one touch, Just one smoke, one puff, and one try can lead you to a wrong decision. A decision full of regret and smoker lungs. One that will lead you down to the dark hallways full of smoke. A place full of the smells of bad decisions. I, am full bad decisons. Thats right. I, the Christian girl who tries to make her parents, and God proud, am a sinner. Shocker? I think not. Innocent? Oh far from it. I’ve been at lonely bars with cups full of liquor to try and ease the pain, I’ve kissed strangers who I was never meant to kiss. You get the gist. I am 21 and slightly confused. Because I am not perfect, and I never will be. But that’s okay. I have made some horrible decisions lately. I am full of raw honesty. I make bad decisions constantly. Because of this, I beat myself up and I start to automatically feel so incredibly ashamed and disgusted with myself, and keep going back to the things of my past. I feel shame for being something I was never meant to be, and for going to places I was never meant to be at in the first place. I feel this way sometimes, and maybe you too have felt this way. I feel this way, because I know in my heart, that I, and perhaps even you have let your guard down, and then you look down and see yourself in a puddle of sin. But hey, we all make mistakes and nobody was born perfect.
We have all been there, and maybe you don’t like admitting it. Maybe you bottle up those regrets and shame. Maybe you lock it all away in that steel locker of a heart you have. You throw away the key and try to not look back. You make mistakes, and you don’t wear a halo. And that your hands are stained like mine with regrets, and smells you wish you would have never come in contact with. You look in the mirror and face yourself daily and try not to cry because you feel like the biggest sinner in the world. Maybe that’s not you, but it’s me, and perhaps a lot of us. We have faced those doors that lead to the things we wish to never speak about out loud. Yet, we continue to open those doors of bad decisions and let them take over our lives. We humans are constantly a commotion, and continuation of people who make terrible, bad, and ruthless decisions daily. Which can either hurt us to the point where we end up feeling alone and full of regret. Or those doors can lead us to amazing opportunities and an abundance of life and joy. But those doors aren’t always kind, and we have the decision to walk through that door. The choice is ours.
Nonetheless, no matter how awful, disgusted, and nasty you feel, God does not love you any less. He loves you even more because of the choices you made. And guess what? he knew before you even decided to open that door full of bad decisions, what was going to happen before you even opened that door. Because he is God, and that’s just the way he is. All – consuming love, neverending mercy, and unmeasurable forgiveness. His son Jesus Christ of Nazareth came into this world to save us sinners. BECAUSE HE LOVES US. Sin is sin, but God will never give up on you. You may look into the mirror and see a girl/guy (depending on your gender) someone who doesn’t deserve his everlasting love because you feel so dirty, and ashamed of yourself, because of what you did. However, God sees past our mistakes, errors, and sins and forgives us each time we ask for his forgiveness. Although we say to ourselves, “How can God love someone like ME?!? An iniquity to the world, a potty mouth, a druggy, a murderer, an adulter, a wicked person, a thief, a liar, a SINNER. How could he love someone like me?!?” He loves someone like you, because he died or you. For our sins. BECAUSE HE LOVES US!!! He LOVES his children. Us the sinners that feel like garbage, and don’t feel like they deserve his love. He LOVES us.
Mark 2:17 says “It is not those who are well who need a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.’” Oh how loves me, a sinner. Oh how he loves YOU, US, WE sinners. Jesus never called into his church those who seem to live perfect lives, who believe they don’t live in sin. No! Jesus called US, the sinners to enter into the church and be saved. BECAUSE HE LOVES US! He loves the sinners. He will gladly clean up your messy life, your sinful heart, and pour out his loving arms and take you in. He will wash you, and cleanse you of your sins because his grace his neverending. HE LOVES YOU.
He loves to clean us up. To bathe our crusty souls, and filthy minds. The parts we wish to never uncover, the sins of our youth, the past that still makes us feel like we shouldn’t be capable of being loved, by such a pure soul. He comes with open arms and gladly purifies our souls. Psalms 51:7 says- “Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” Jesus can make the mud, gunk, , and smell of sin become whiter than snow , because that is just how loving he simply is.
It doesn’t matter how dirty and ashamed you are, or think you are Psalms 86:15 says, “.But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.” He not only cleanses us, but guarantees us his steadfast love. And for that, we should love that he loves our sinful selves.
He even loves those who shouldn’t be loved, the one’s who society says to stay away from. Including the one’s who oversexualize themselves. Let us not forget that Jesus loved the prostitute, even though she was an adultress. The woman who was thought of as filthy, dirty, and perverted, because she sold her body for sex. You may feel like that prostitute sometimes. Perhaps not because of a sexual decision, but maybe because of some decisions you made in your past. A prostitute to the world. A lover of the world who sold herself to society. But guess what? He loves the prostitutes and those stinking bad decisions. He loves every dirty thing you believe yourself to be because his love can wash away those dirty things you think about yourself. Although he is not a lover of sin, he is a healer and cleanser of our sins.
It says in John 8:1-11:
But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning, He went back into the temple courts. All the people came to Him, and He sat down to teach them. And the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before them and said, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such a woman. So what do You say?”They said this to test Him, in order to have a basis for accusing Him. But Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with His finger. When they continued to question Him, He straightened up and said to them, “Whoever is without sin among you, let him be the first to cast a stone at her.” And again He bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard this, they began to go away one by one, beginning with the older ones, until only Jesus was left, with the woman standing there. Then Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are your accusers? Has no one condemned you?” “No one, Lord,” she answered.“Neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Now go and sin no more.”
I conclude this post by saying, let’s stop running to the things of this world that make us feel like we are not capable of being loved. Let’s stop making love to the world, Let’s stop trying to face our sins alone. Let’s stop looking down on ourselves, and let’s start loving who we are each day. Let’s let love consume us. Let’s be love. Let’s let Jesus love us, and let’s learn to love one another truly and genuinely. Love your neighbor, love your gay friend, love the athiests, love the sinners, but most of all Love, Love, Love yourself. And let us never forget that nothing can separate us from the love of God.
“ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 8:37-39
STOP. START. LOVE
-Love and blessings , Jenny
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