And we were created in the image of Christ. So you can bet that the essence of Christ Himself is love and compassion. But why do we follow Him?
1 John 4:19 says " We love Him because He first loved us."
We love Him because we know that He looked upon us when we were still covered and tarnished with the sin that we chose, holding in our hands the nails and hammer that would crucify Him. Yet He saw not the sin. Instead He saw His children who needed His help to be whole again. He saw a precious gem that He created, eternally separated from Him. And so, because love and mercy are the essence of His being, He came down and saved our soles from their fate. As well as making it possible for us to have a relationship with Him while still on earth. When we, as His creation, realize this, we see that we have nothing sufficient enough to give Him in return. And so, we give Him our hearts, devotion and all the love we can.
Now lets look into the essence of love itself. Many people think that it is a nice warm feeling you get when you meet someone you like, or someone who changes your life. But the bible has a very different definition of love.
1 Corinthians 13:4-8 says "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails."
So we clearly see that love is an action as well as a command.
Mark 12:31-32 " And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is, like, namely this, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these."
The bible also says:
John 14:15 " If you love me keep my commandments."
So now we see the connection.We love God because He first loved us. And we follow In His Footsteps, learning how to grow in Christ and striving to keep His commandments, because we love Him.
His faithfulness, grace, kindness, and continuing love is what keeps us at His side.
Now, for the sake of those of you who were not able to read the notes I've posted on FaceBook, I've decided to follow my mothers suggestion and re post them here. Once a day, for one week. And for those of you who have already read them, there will be pictures and videos added in here and there. Here is the first......
Storm Story
This past week and a half has been one of the most challenging, and exhausting times I think I've ever been through. But God has taught me and everyone else around me so much through it all. I know all of you have probably been hearing a lot of tidbits of information about the whole story, so I thought I would share my side of the story. Maybe it will help clear some things up.
I don't remember being afraid when I woke up the morning of April 27th. It was 6:30 and the wind and rain was so heavy that I was startled awake. The first thing I thought was I needed to bring the dogs inside, since they are all small and four of them are puppies. (This is usually my first thought when a bad storm comes.) So when I got to the kitchen mom was there watching the storm from the sliding glass door in the kitchen. The wind was blowing so hard that the rain was literally almost sideways and coming in sheets as well. I brought in the dogs, and noticed that even from the middle of our covered porch the rain was still slapping me in the face so hard I couldn't see what I was doing. After the dogs were all safely in the laundry room I stood in the kitchen with mom, just watching. It was bad yes, but it wasn't like it was something we'd never seen before. So I went back to bed (It was too early for me) and so did mom.
When I woke up again later on that morning, the sky was clear and the sun was out. I don't think it was windy (usually I notice), just calm and sunny. Mom looked worried, so I asked her what was going on. She told me that there was a bad storm coming and that we had already lost power that morning, and that she wasn't sure what we should do. Jesse wasn't there, he had gone to run some errands that morning I think, and dad was at work. A little later on mom told me that Jesse had called and told her that he had talked to Arron Crawford, Jesse's close friend and work partner. We knew the family as well, Kelley is the mother and together they have nine children. Bria is the oldest and she had become a friend of mine and my sisters. We had gotten to know them all mostly through attending a weekly bible study that they held at the banquet hall connected to their house, called The Cedar House. Arron had told Jesse that we were welcome to come and stay in his basement to ride out the storm (as he had done many times before). We had never accepted before because we never thought it would get that bad. But this time mom was considering it.
She told me at around 12:30 that the storm would cross the Mississippi\Alabama state line at around 2:00 and that we would head to the Crawford's shorltey there after, giving us plenty of time to get there safely and it would give us a chance to call dad before he got off of work at three and tell him not to go home but to come to the Crawford's. We couldn't call from the house because we had terrible coverage there. As we were pulling out of the driveway however, Jesse was pulling in. He told us that it didn't look like it was going to be that bad and that we should probably wait. So we went back inside, Jesse plugged up the generator and we watched James Spann for a while.
I remember telling mom that if we didn't go to the Crawford's, we might regret it. I had no idea at the time just how right I was. Once Jesse got a satellite reading on his phone of just where the storm was he said that we definitely needed to go and go now. So we did. When we got to the Crawford's I felt somewhat silly, I had a backpack full of mostly books and a few other things and was carrying it into the Crawford's along with a bag of food my mom had brought. Their going to think were overreacting and nothing is probably going to happen anyway, is what I thought. When we got to the door I saw a few of the kids playing in a pool in the yard. Bria met us at the door and welcomed us in with a smile. Mrs. Crawford was sitting on a couch in the living room. They told us that they had just gotten back from the hospital because that morning, Mrs. Liveret (Kelley's dad) had a massive heart attack, they had put three stints in his heart and he was fine then. But he had been saying his goodbyes earlier that morning and didn't think he was going to make it. So for the Crawford's it had been a long and exhausting day. We all talked for a while (by the way the Liveret's lived on the same driveway as the Crawford's, just further up it.) mostly about the weather, we watched James Spann some more and after a while. When the conversation had gotten a little slow, I decided to go downstairs to the basement and watch Tangled with my younger siblings and the Crawford kids.
Her are a few pics of our house before the storm
I tried to find some pictures of the Crawford's before the storm but I can't as of yet, so I'll post those later. As for now, these are the before pictures of ours and the afters will come later.
I don't remember being afraid when I woke up the morning of April 27th. It was 6:30 and the wind and rain was so heavy that I was startled awake. The first thing I thought was I needed to bring the dogs inside, since they are all small and four of them are puppies. (This is usually my first thought when a bad storm comes.) So when I got to the kitchen mom was there watching the storm from the sliding glass door in the kitchen. The wind was blowing so hard that the rain was literally almost sideways and coming in sheets as well. I brought in the dogs, and noticed that even from the middle of our covered porch the rain was still slapping me in the face so hard I couldn't see what I was doing. After the dogs were all safely in the laundry room I stood in the kitchen with mom, just watching. It was bad yes, but it wasn't like it was something we'd never seen before. So I went back to bed (It was too early for me) and so did mom.
When I woke up again later on that morning, the sky was clear and the sun was out. I don't think it was windy (usually I notice), just calm and sunny. Mom looked worried, so I asked her what was going on. She told me that there was a bad storm coming and that we had already lost power that morning, and that she wasn't sure what we should do. Jesse wasn't there, he had gone to run some errands that morning I think, and dad was at work. A little later on mom told me that Jesse had called and told her that he had talked to Arron Crawford, Jesse's close friend and work partner. We knew the family as well, Kelley is the mother and together they have nine children. Bria is the oldest and she had become a friend of mine and my sisters. We had gotten to know them all mostly through attending a weekly bible study that they held at the banquet hall connected to their house, called The Cedar House. Arron had told Jesse that we were welcome to come and stay in his basement to ride out the storm (as he had done many times before). We had never accepted before because we never thought it would get that bad. But this time mom was considering it.
She told me at around 12:30 that the storm would cross the Mississippi\Alabama state line at around 2:00 and that we would head to the Crawford's shorltey there after, giving us plenty of time to get there safely and it would give us a chance to call dad before he got off of work at three and tell him not to go home but to come to the Crawford's. We couldn't call from the house because we had terrible coverage there. As we were pulling out of the driveway however, Jesse was pulling in. He told us that it didn't look like it was going to be that bad and that we should probably wait. So we went back inside, Jesse plugged up the generator and we watched James Spann for a while.
I remember telling mom that if we didn't go to the Crawford's, we might regret it. I had no idea at the time just how right I was. Once Jesse got a satellite reading on his phone of just where the storm was he said that we definitely needed to go and go now. So we did. When we got to the Crawford's I felt somewhat silly, I had a backpack full of mostly books and a few other things and was carrying it into the Crawford's along with a bag of food my mom had brought. Their going to think were overreacting and nothing is probably going to happen anyway, is what I thought. When we got to the door I saw a few of the kids playing in a pool in the yard. Bria met us at the door and welcomed us in with a smile. Mrs. Crawford was sitting on a couch in the living room. They told us that they had just gotten back from the hospital because that morning, Mrs. Liveret (Kelley's dad) had a massive heart attack, they had put three stints in his heart and he was fine then. But he had been saying his goodbyes earlier that morning and didn't think he was going to make it. So for the Crawford's it had been a long and exhausting day. We all talked for a while (by the way the Liveret's lived on the same driveway as the Crawford's, just further up it.) mostly about the weather, we watched James Spann some more and after a while. When the conversation had gotten a little slow, I decided to go downstairs to the basement and watch Tangled with my younger siblings and the Crawford kids.
Her are a few pics of our house before the storm
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| Coming in from feeding Shadow c ; |
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| Jesse's Shop ( Built by Jesse, Dad and others ) |
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| The Chicken Coop ( Also built by Jesse and Dad ) |
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| The car and suburban in this picture were damaged in the storm. |
I tried to find some pictures of the Crawford's before the storm but I can't as of yet, so I'll post those later. As for now, these are the before pictures of ours and the afters will come later.
