Finally a Breakthrough

O MY GOODNESS!!! I feel so beyond renewed. God has been working furiously in my life these past few months and I am finally being able to see it. After spending a most amazing week at home with my beautiful family, I had the most incredible honor of leading one of my most beloved friends to a faith in Christ. It has been the most beautiful experience watching her resist Him, warm up to Him, accept Him, and now grow in Him. If anything, through all of this, God has taught me my own insignificance. In that, I was putting so much weight on my failures and mistakes, thinking they were keeping me from connecting with my Father. How important I thought myself that something I do keeps Him from working in and through me...I was so mistaken. In fact, through my failures and inadequacy he worked through me to touch someone's heart and woo them to a love for Him. I am far too small to mess up God's plan, and not only did he decide to work despite my mistakes, but He USED me through my mistakes. O how glorious He is! He promises to equip us and be strong in our weakness and that has been so evident to me.
Furthermore, I have learned so much about what it means to love someone. Befriending this girl, I had no ulterior motive other than love her. I wasn't loving her so that she would become a Christian or so that she would see Christ in me. These were definitely important and came into play, but I befriended her simply because I loved her. And I would love her just as much if she never prayed to receive Christ. God requests that we love Him and love others. He doesn't grant us the right to judge others or the power to save others. just love them. And through our honest, unyielding love (that we only receive because of Him) He will shine through and touch that persons heart. It isn't about giving someone a bible, or telling them God loves them...those things are and can be important, but its just about being there for people when they need someone. Why do we complicate it to more than that? God will do His work. His plan will happen. All we need to do is just what he asks: love. Let's not make it more than that. I feel like if everyone understood that all the time, myself included, (not meaning to throw out a cliche) the world would be a better place. So I challenge you to reevaluate how you treat people. Everyone you come into contact with. Do you love them? Do you edify them with your words? What about the people you interact with and don't even speak to? Would a smile or kind "Hello" change their day or perhaps even their life for the better? My goal is to let God's love run through me fully. I want to shine love to every single person I see every single day. In Ephesians we are told to speak to one anther in psalms and hymns, give thanks, walk as we are in the light, find what is acceptable to God, redeem the time, understand God's will, be filled with the Spirit, Sing to the Lord, Be renewed, put on righteousness and holiness, give to those in need, edify with our words, be kind and forgive, be imitators of god and WALK IN LOVE...