Catalyst

I thought that I would only need to do one quick post about love to just kind of sum up 1 Corinthians 13 and then be done. But as it turns out, God is continuing to teach me about love and so of course, blogging helps me to organize my thoughts so once again the topic will be about love. I mentioned last time in my post 'Love Is...' that 1 Corinthians 13 had been on my mind a lot and I wanted to learn how to love someone, not just in a romantic way, but as a sister in the body of Christ, so when I wrote that post it was more about brotherly love. But today I want to lean more to the side of romantic love.

   I've been praying and asking God for a ton of wisdom when it comes to my relationships lately because it seems like I'm in one giant mess with my friends. It's a crazy situation; and to make that even crazier...well, there's a guy involved. So I've been asking God how to proceed in terms of my friendship with this guy and last night He really spoke to my via my older brother. Now Shane has said that I'm not allowed to date previously mentioned guy and since I would expect any guy to ask my brother to get permission to date me first, I was a bit worried as to why he would say that. Last night I finally asked him about it and his answer left me with a ton of things to think and pray about.

   "A catalyst." He told me. Of course I had no idea what he was talking about so he had to elaborate more. "Say you have two elements that don't react together at all, but then you insert something there that works as a catalyst, and it makes the elements react and in some cases, blow up." I didn't see how that had to do with me and my guy friend but he continued. He explained that we (me and my friend.) both have the same fatal flaw. Anger. He pointed out to me that when I get angry, I fight. I love to argue. My friend also has that same tendency. So what happens when we both get angry? I've had to talk to him before when he was upset, but I was calm. What were to happen if we were both upset about something? There was that part of me that wanted to say that of course I would push my wants aside for someone else, but I was forced to get real with myself. Would I actually give up what I wanted?

   Its so easy to say that you would be able to give up anything for someone because you love them. But would you? Sure you can say that now when you're just a silly teenager who's falling head over heels for a guy and when he smiles at you and your heart races and you want to just be with him forever because he sent you a good morning text. You swear you would give up the world for him. But would you still think that when you're trying to clean up the house and all he's doing is watching TV? What about when he wants the air conditioning on but you want to keep the windows open? And of course that day when you have a giant argument because the bills need to get paid and no one knows where the money has gone so when you lay down in bed at night and don't face each other or say anything at all because you just want him to listen to you for once. Can you still give up your way for him? Even when he's not doing the same for you.

   I'm finding out that that's what love is. Love isn't a feeling. We like to think it is, but it isn't. Because in marriage, you won't always feel like loving your spouse. Love is a choice. It's choosing to say "I care more about our relationship than whatever it is we're arguing about." You won't have those butterflies in your stomach when he accidentally threw away something of value to you, but love is when you bite your tongue and don't yell at him for it, because you love him more than the object he threw away.

   Shane pointed out a fatal flaw of mine with the potential to ruin my friendship with someone I care very much about. After he pointed this out I began to notice the ways in which this flaw of mine has started to corrupt other relationships of mine. I realized that I often let my selfish ambitions trump my love for my friends and I am way too quick to anger which completely goes against what the bible tells me to do in James 1:19-20. "But each one of you must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to become angry. For the anger of men does not achieve the righteousness of God." That's a verse I am going to be thinking very hard about and keeping in mind a lot. I have asked God to help me with my little "catalyst" problem so that means I'm probably going to have people annoying me up and down this week and I'll be tempted to yell a whole lot. I read James this morning and a lot of the verses stuck out to me about taming the tongue and other such things. In the beginning hand last night.it says that if you ask God for wisdom, He'll give it to you. I experienced that first hand last night

   I hope this gave you something to think about. What is your "fatal flaw?" Ask God to reveal it to you and give you guidance as of how to overcome it.