Love!

What was the main thing that God taught me on the retreat? Love. It seems so simple, yet it was so profound. I do not have enough writing talent to truly convey my experience at the retreat. Spending about ten totally silent, totally uninterrupted hours alone with God in the picturesque setting on the Blue Ridge mountains was unprecedented for me. Never have I had that kind of uninterrupted time with God. Not to mention on top of that, three nights and days of uplifting, godly conversations and prayer time, with nine women, on our knees before the Father. Pouring out our hearts to Him and to each other. Praying for and with each other and lifting up our husbands and children. It was absolutely awesome. I really have no words.

I do want to share that the main thing that God spoke to me over the weekend was concerning love. I went to the retreat with a list of things I needed to talk over with God. Things that I wanted answers about. I will tell you that I did not get everything crystallized for me. I did not leave there with my neat little list of answers for life. But, I heard from God on EVERY single thing I asked Him about. Everything! It was an amazing and humbling experience, because I have to tell you, some of the things I asked Him were really insignificant in the grand scheme of things. In light of worldwide poverty, economic depression, spiritual darkness, and disease, some of my questions were just plain shallow. And He answered every one of them in some form. Sometimes He told me that He was not going to answer me, because He wanted me to trust Him. Sometimes He gave me direction about something. Sometimes He said "no." I have to tell you though, hearing from God is awesome, even if he doesn't give you the answer you want. Just knowing that He cares about me personally really blows me away. The same God who parted the Red Sea, who crumbled the walls of Jericho, and who raised Jesus from the dead spent time with me in Blue Ridge, Georgia and answered my silly questions. So, believe me, if He is willing to do that, He will spend time with you. And if you seek after Him with all of your heart, you WILL find Him. His Word promises us that.

You may be wondering specifically what I needed to learn about love. Well, if you know me at all you know that one of my biggest struggles is with fellow believers who don't live according to my standards. I really hate to write that out, because I know how bad it sounds. About as bad as it is. If my standards are from the Word of God, that is one thing, but for some reason, I tend to believe that everyone should adopt all of the things that I feel passionately about as their very own standards. Let me tell you something really startling - everyone doesn't always do what I think they should! Even more amazing....it's OK! Everyone does not have to do exactly what I do. God speaks to each of us individually and each person will give their own account to God. I must only account for myself. Don't hear me say that I have no responsibility towards others or that there is no standard for right and wrong. On the contrary, there is a very clear standard and I have a great responsibility to brothers and sisters that are tangled up in wicked sin. However, there is a vast difference in wicked sin and "Shelby's standards." And even more importantly, if someone is truly a believer, then he or she has the Holy Spirit living inside them and He is a much better at convicting people of sin than I am!

When I left for the retreat, part of what I was eager to discuss with God was which of the standards I had set for myself and my family were truly clearly marked in Scripture, which were individually spoken to me for our family, and which were just legalistic rules that I had invented. You see, another struggle of mine is that I take my role as a mom and homeschooler very seriously. I acknowledge that there are some things that I only have one chance to get right, and one of those things is the task of raising my children. I know that no one is perfect and that there is forgiveness for even the worst offense, but I want to get it right the first time. I want this so badly that sometimes I forget that the Lord walks before and behind my children, that He is their teacher and He gives them great peace. (see Isaiah 54:13)
My job is really to point them to Jesus, not worry and fret over every mistake or imperfection. Still, I struggle with this and I see people, either from afar or in my circle of friends and acquaintances that I truly admire. The problem comes in when, instead of gleaning bits and pieces from people I admire and then through prayer letting God individually form our family, I try to implement every single thing I glean from each person I admire. As you can imagine this creates utter confusion on the part of my poor children and husband, who can not keep up with my latest "idea." It creates frustration on my part, because I can't even remember what I was going to change this week, and it definitely causes my children to look at me and know that I am not trusting God because I am trying to turn our family into a clone of everyone else's.

So, I took my frustration with myself to God at the retreat. I even had certain people, some popular Christian homeschooling speakers that I admire and like to listen to, and some people I know personally that I held up before Him and I said, "Should I be like this person or this person? I admire them both, but they have totally different theological beliefs and standards for their families. How can they both be right? Which one is right?" This was one of those questions that God's answer to me was that He was not going to tell me who was "right." It doesn't really matter, because He has a plan for the redemption of mankind. Those believers with different theological positions are reaching those whom God has called them to reach. (Note that I am not talking about the gospel of Jesus, I am talking about debatable issues in the Scriptures. Issues that brilliant godly people on two ends of the theological spectrum can not agree on.) Though He never did give me a clear answer to who is right (which I really, really wanted) - He did tell me that I needed to not try to "be like" anyone but myself and that I needed to look to Him to mold and shape our family to be uniquely ours - but, that I needed to spend time with and let "iron sharpen iron" under mentors whose underlying premise is love.

I have met many, many believers over the years through churches, homeschooling, Stan's business, etc.... I know godly people from just about every Christian denomination I can think of. People who love their families, their children, and who love the Lord. The "deep thinkers" are absolutely passionate about apologetics, and I have met some very young people who I do not doubt could debate theology with the most brilliant minds in the church. I am not brilliant, though I love to read and study and I love apologetics. I think it is dire to know what we believe because we live in a world where we are constantly bombarded with images that are pornographic, godless, and completely sinister. The world is after our children and satan is after our very souls. I know that sounds really morbid, and I don't mean to be dark - God has won, we have no need to fear!

Even though all of that is true, Scriptures clearly tell us that without love we are just a bunch of noise. So, we can have all the knowledge of Scripture, we can have all the proper theology, we can attend church, and we can follow all the rules - but, if we do not love what Jesus loves, we will never have all the power He has promised us. The word love is used 442 times in the King James Bible and charity another 24. The "love" chapter, 1 Corithians 13 tells us that if we have not love, nothing that we say or any of the knowledge that we attain has any meaning at all. 13:3 says, "And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity." Jesus came because God so "loved" the world. He died for the sake of love. We must imitate Him and show love to a lost and dying world. Without love, all of life is meaningless.