Rain... thunder... lightning...

Rain falls... thunder rolls... lightning makes the night become day. God. No other is capable of such greatness. Some might call it rain. It is God. Some might call it thunder. It is God. Some might call it lightning. It is God. Beyond these things, it is good, because it is God.

Sorrow fills my soul this night. These are the times when you come to know who true friends are and come to doubt others. Do these others have an agenda? Do they love so that I might do something? Or do they love because they are called by Christ to love with no condition? Do they really love at all?

Children, women, men... all over the world... dying from hunger. In pain. Loving. Being strong. Even with death near. Do we care? Do we know? Do we love?

Answering the call of Christ is not to love when it is convenient to us. It is to love when it pains us most. When we'd like to not love. When we'd rather turn our eyes to a more joyous time... to pretend for a moment that pain is not there knocking on our door. Through this, we must love. To follow Christ is to love in the dark corners... in the homes of sorrow and pain... in the places and to the people we'd rather not encounter. It is not easy. Yet it is our call. To love Christ is to do these things. To ignore these things is to ignore our Father's desire for us.

We must never surrender to any way of this world, even for a moment. To have a moment where we strive for anything less than perfection is to spend a moment outside of true desire to follow Christ. For Christ calls us to come and die from our old life and be born into a life of discipleship. Do we know this? Do we seek this? Do we strive to be this each and every day?

To truly follow Christ, we must love with our all every moment of our lives. This is our call. It is not new - it is everlasting and alive today, just as Christ. He lives within us to remind us of His love - that we may share this love with all whom we encounter every second of every day.

The love of Christ fills my heart with joy this night. Joy that overpowers the burden of sorrow. When we cry out to Jesus, He will guide us, He will comfort us, He will love us like no other. He alone turns darkness into light... a light that can never be bright enough. It only grows, as we let it dwell within us and become brighter with each day we continue to follow Him. May we learn by this example, so that we might be the hands and feet of Jesus upon this earth - to share His love with those who need it most - and by spreading the Kingdom upon this earth, prepare the way of the Lord.

Praise be to our God, for He is worthy. Hallelujah. God is good.

all praise be to you Jesus,
chris

<><