I've Had Choices

Caught up in the rolling waves of life, we tumble and get tossed and go every which way.  Our emotions grab us and we feel helpless to all life throws at us.  I don't know about you, but that pretty much sums up the first thirty years of my life!

Keeping it simple, keeping it real, and by all means, keeping it as country as possible, I will use the immortal words of the late George Jones for all of you out there who can appreciate the reference:

"I've had choices since the day that I was born
There were voices that told me right from wrong"*

Even though I had choices since the day I was born, nothing was ever a choice in my mind.  Life happened, life attacked, and it would take giving my life to Christ to ever so slowly begin to learn the choice lessons I am about to share with you over the next few days.....

The first thing I learned back in those days seems so simple to me now...love is a CHOICE!  Let that sink in for a minute because, once it does, it will rock your world.  Love is not an emotion.  Viewing love as a choice will make every single relationship that you have stronger.  The definition of the agape love that is in the Bible is, in fact, an action!  I often refer to a fabulous site for help with biblical questions, it is called GotQuestion.org.  This site defines agape love as this:   

"Agape is a sacrificial love that voluntarily suffers inconvenience, discomfort, and even death for the benefit of another without expecting anything in return"

Read that again...without expecting anything in return. And did you see that list?  Suffers? Inconvenience?  Discomfort? Death?? Who does that?  Ohhhhhhhh.... wait a minute...I know the One who DID do that..and because of Him, I can do it too.  It is a selfless act that comes to us much easier and more naturally than one would think when they are living in their emotions only.  

Gotquestions.org goes on to quote Ephesians:

 5 ^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. (MSG)

And it sounds difficult, but I promise you it is THE most freeing choice you will ever make.  The instant I learned that I could choose to love my husband, despite the fact that we were in a never-ending pit, was the moment our world began to change.  It was the instant he began to see the change in me he had been hoping to see. Making the choice to love during such an insane time was the miracle we needed to change everything. Amazingly, when he realized that I honestly was not expecting anything in return, THAT was when he began to love me more than ever before!!!!

I pray that you, my friend, reading this, can examine the one person in your world today that God has called you to love with full agape love, keeping in mind, it may not even be someone who is currently showing you ANY love at the moment, but that's ok, luckily that is not a requirement for you to make the choice of showing love to someone right here, right now.  Who has God put on your heart?

Til next time when we will discuss the next CHOICE on the list! In the meantime I would love to hear from you..please feel free to leave a comment here, or like our Facebook page Hills of Mercy Hollers of Grace and comment there:)

God Bless and Love Everyone!

Ps...I linked up today over at To Love Honor and Vacuum!  Great name for a blog, don't ya think??
http://tolovehonorandvacuum.com/

* song and lyrics by George Jones