A Heart for People

'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' -Matthew 22:37-38

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. -Galatians 6:9


I've had a serious writer's block going, and it's been going for quite a while. I knew exactly when it started, and even had an inkling why, but didn't quite know from where the source of it was springing.

It started around the time of the election that disappointed and, quite honestly, even scared me, though I'm not going to get into political hot topics right now. That was part of it, but it was more the behavior of people I was observing on the news and interacting with directly, in response to the election that really got to me and shut down my "muse", so to speak... Sickened and saddened me to the point that I just felt I had nothing to say for a while.

Eventually I was able to write something, but only when I got angry about a gross injustice within the Carepage community, where I maintain a page for my health issues. The result of that was "Sin Diagnosis". After I got that out of my system, again I found myself with nothing to say. A friend even gently approached me to inquire as to whether I'd lost my faith, because I hadn't been writing. No... that's remained strong throughout.

After a while, I found myself wanting to write again, to write about what God has been teaching me, and I made a lot of false starts, but just couldn't seem to stick with it and finish anything. My heart wasn't in it. Not really. Because there was this disgruntled feeling inside that I just couldn't get rid of. It didn't help that within my personal life, I was struggling something awful with my health, and feeling like I was doing it all alone. Though we're encouraged to help one another, there just never seems to be anybody near, able and willing to provide any help for me. And I felt discouraged and very lonely.

And it didn't help that, as society continued its decline from bad to worse, going out in public became increasingly unpleasant. Despite police efforts to combat it, road rage continues to get worse, until even driving to the local grocery store sometimes feels like a big risk. And it's getting harder to find anybody who will return a smile and a friendly 'hello', so that sometimes I feel downright invisible because of the lack of response my smiles are getting! Within the stores, people are just pushing their carts around with scowls on their faces, quickly expressing exasperation for people encroaching on their "personal space." An older couple stopped their cart rather than go around my son, who just happened to be in their path and was picking up something he'd dropped before rejoining me, and they turned to glare at me, hands on hips, as if I had no business bringing children into a grocery store. And on another occasion in a different sort of store, a young woman took her frustrations out on my husband, simply because he was "in her way" while he was perusing the shelves looking for a birthday gift for our youngest child. He hadn't even been aware she was there, until she loudly sighed, and he promptly apologized and stepped out of her way, only to be called a foul name in response! This sort of unwarranted rudeness just seems to be skyrocketing lately, in our experience. It's very discouraging. And doesn't do much to make me feel any love for my fellow humans.

And therein lies the crux... I hadn't lost my heart for God. I'd lost my heart for people! I was feeling no love for these people who were doing nothing to deserve any, never mind that it's often those who least deserve love who most need it demonstrated to them. I'd grown weary of doing good, and wanted nothing to do with anybody who might take and then give nothing in return. And THAT was stopping up my desire to write, which is definitely a labor of love that doesn't really yield much tangible reward. Praise God that He always loves us faithfully! Praise God that when you realize your well of love is empty, and ask Him to fill it, He does so abundantly! Asking Him to fill you with His love for others, whether it be for one particular difficult person, or the general mass of mankind, always works! And because His love for people is once again flowing through me, so again are my words flowing out into cyberspace.

Father, thank you so much for Your unfailing love, given freely to us all, though we are undeserving and so often fail to return any love to You. And thank you, Father, for being so generous in sharing that love with us, just for the asking! Help us to apply that where ever there is a need in our lives, where ever there are people that we are having trouble loving. Turn us into veritable fountains of Christ's love, splashing it forth on all around us, luring the lost towards You, and shining a ray of hope into the darkness of this fallen world. In Jesus' name, amen.


P.S. Despite the event that triggered "Sin Diagnosis", www.carepages.com is a terrific place to go to set up a page to keep your family and friends apprised of medical situations, including pregnancies. And it's free!