The same thing is true in our relationships. We are looking at the loves in our life this summer on the blog, and the First Love of our lives–the one with Jesus Christ–works the same way. It doesn’t stay the same. It grows or becomes stagnant. As we work on our love relationship with the Lord, there are also some things that we can say to grow the hands-down most important relationship in our lives!
Did anyone else go to summer camp? I did. It was this odd experience unlike any of the rest of my childhood or anything I had been taught up to that point. Summer camp is the one week of life that it’s ok for parents to drive their kids somewhere, leave them for a week, and pick them up the following weekend. Being a camp counselor was a much better deal! Two free concessions per day, adult only swim, and playing cards at night with the worship team were enough to make you feel important. (No, apparently it doesn’t take much at seventeen.)
Can you picture yourself there? Go ahead. Put yourself in summer camp for a few minutes. Ok, so let’s say it was a good week. Let’s say you met someone. He likes everything you like. You sing the same songs while you’re walking to the cafeteria. He plays guitar. Awesome sense of humor. Good week. Massively great week.
And then it ends.
You say you are going to call and write, and then life happens. He calls and you’re not home. He sends letters, but you don’t return them because you can’t think of anything cute enough to say or you don’t like the way the doodles on your paper turned out in green sparkle ink. Why didn’t you go with lavender?? Then school starts, you have no one to sit with at lunch, and it is in that moment precisely that you really wish you had someone to talk to.
Ok, anyone else? No, this never happened to me. But don’t you think it gets to be the same way with God? We can have this moment in our lives where we are on fire for God, and it is awesome and He does amazing things in our situation. We think it is always going to be like this.
And then life takes over.
We have jobs and kids and cooking and cleaning. We try to get quality time with our kids, hubby time, BFF time, time for ourselves. He called and we weren’t around. He wrote the most awesome love letter of all time! But we didn’t respond. We thought our day was too menial to talk about, our issues were too much drama, we didn’t look cute enough to see Him, we didn’t sing pretty enough to worship Him, and at the end of the day we fell asleep before we could breathe another word.
#ThatsHowItWent #NoJudging
I totally get that. I have had days like that, but what if we tried something different? What if we didn’t make a big deal about having to be amazing or waiting for fireworks? What if we just say something to Him.
Love You. When you get up and fix your coffee and get creamer out of the fridge. Thank You for taking care of me. When there are clothes to wash and food to fix. Thanks for thinking I can do this. When the kids need you and need you and need you and need you. I trust You. When your self-employed husband has a slow week and the house payment is due. I know You’ve got me covered. When there aren’t enough hours in the day or enough you to go around. He knows. He seriously knows.
I love what my pastor always says. “God is not undone by this.” He always knows what is going on in your life, and all we have to do is to stay connected. Why don’t you try it this week? Find your favorite Scripture and make it a prayer.
Here’s one from 1John 3:1: How great is Your love, Lord, that You have poured out on me, that I can be called a child of God.
Have a great Fourth of July, and join me next week for tips on loving our “Kingdom Man”!
Where Grace Found Me 
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