Love like that

Blog Post by Wendy Kauffman

Isaiah 42:6-7

“I, the Lord, have called you to demonstrate my righteousness. I will take you by the hand and guard you, and I will give you to my people, Israel, as a symbol of my covenant with them. And you will be a light to guide the nations. 7.You will open the eyes of the blind. You will free the captives from prison, releasing those who sit in dark dungeons. Isaiah 42:6-7

Brian comes every Saturday to the breakfast we provide for the homeless. He is almost always waiting for us. We can barely get the van parked and there he is ready to open the door, unload everything and to talk. I know he comes every week to eat, but more than anything else he comes to just unload about his week and in some ways I think to make sure we are still there. I think it is a way to reorient their week. They crave the consistency of the community. Brian puts on a tough guy front. There are times when you can tell he is really afraid. We like to talk about movies and the West Coast. He dreams someday of living in Montana.

A couple of weeks ago, as I was helping serve up plates I looked at how many were there. Every week it seems that there are 2-3 new faces. It is getting harder to remember every ones name. We did not have enough table space and chairs for every one. We barely had enough food and we are now taking three big thermoses of coffee. I almost cried. I felt very overwhelmed by how great their needs are and how little we have to offer.

I have been reading in Isaiah and I love this scripture in Chapter 42. I ask God all the time, How can we we do this? How can we set captives free and release people from the dark dungeons. We just have nothing to give right now. A few days ago I read this passage in Ephesians:1-2,Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that.

I was thinking about this the other night when I was up late, praying that night that Brian would not be afriad, no matter where he was. I think I caught a glimpse of what the world might look like if all of us who say we follow God would really do this. Really follow God, into the unknown, into the pain, into the love that brings hope and freedom.

Please pray that we would love courageously, and that God's outrageous love would be poured into other people's lives through us.

http://youtu.be/GfosSggwQS0