Love Boldly

The Lord is the strength of his people…Psalm 28:8
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We seem to have been swirling in a sea of sorrow, division and hurt the past week.  Words are so powerful and that power has been wielded for good and for bad.  Our newsfeeds and podcasts and news reports have been spewing enough controversy and contradiction to make our heads spin and then slipped quietly into the Mass readings the other day we prayed Psalm 28 and it was as if God said…shhhhh…you are my people, and I am your strength…shhhh.  Personally, I needed to hear that shush from the Father because it gave me permission to turn off the noise and quietly rest in HIM!

Nearly every time I have heard the name Charlie Kirk (a name I didn’t know before last Wednesday) this past week it has been used in combination with the word BOLD.  On some level each and every one of us is called to be bold in our faith but we aren’t called to do it in the same way.   On Monday, Catholics remembered the seven sorrows of Mary, and it was a whisper to my heart.  As I sat in Mass Monday and contemplated the burdens Mary endured it occurred to me that those closest and most committed to Jesus always seem to make huge sacrifices…even his own mother.  I wonder if the greatest way to be bold in our faith is to love bigger and not necessarily talk bigger.

The question I’ve been wrestling with is, how boldly do I love the Lord?  As I’ve puddled that through my brain for a few days I hear my moms’ words echoing that familiar phrase, “Actions speak louder than words!”  I do a lot of “loving” things for the Lord, but do I do them for everyone or just the people who agree with me, think like me or won’t be controversial?  I’ve asked myself again and again if my love is bold enough to push past the point of sacrifice, sorrow or embarrassment?  Do I love till it hurts and leaves me vulnerable or ridiculed or do I stop right on the edge of comfortable? Woof…that kind of love is hard isn’t it!  I think the craziness that’s unfolded before us lately shows just how much this kind of bold love is lacking.

I need to sit with some truth for a while.  The truth is I can’t control anything, not people’s thoughts or words or opinions or perceptions.  The only think I have any control over is my relationship with the Father and if that is really as important to me as I say it is, I have to take a good long prayerful look at how far I’ll go to protect it, nurture it, abide in it, obey it and be changed by it.  The planet doesn’t need my opinions, it doesn’t need my professions of faith, it needs to see God’s love and the only way I’m truly capable of that is to shush up, rely on his strength and ask him for the grace to love boldly without fear.  I think that’s probably the kind of task that will keep us so busy we won’t notice the noise of the world because we’ll be listening too hard for the voice of the Father…seems like a good idea to me…who’s with me?

A Seed To Plant:  Pray this week with the question, Lord how can I love you boldly?
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Blessings on your day!