Leaving a Mark

Inked. This has been the theme that my church has been diving into over the past several weeks. It’s all about relationships and how we need to take them beneath the surface. All of the messages have been great but this past week, the last week of the series, really hit me. My pastor started out by talking about tattoos and how they are related to our relationships. We can have all these plans for our relationships, and even have them drawn out in our minds as far as how they are going to go, but unless we go through not only the good, but the times of pain and discomfort too, they will never go beneath the surface. Just like a tattoo, you can plan what you want and even get it drawn on with marker but unless you actually go through with the pain and discomfort of getting the tattoo, it won’t be permanent and the ink won’t go beneath the surface.

Last week’s service was entitled Inked: Leaving a Mark. Leaving a mark = making a permanent mark on those around you that you will be remembered by. I thought about this and I definitely want to leave a mark on those around me. Don’t you? Who can honestly say they want to live their life out on earth and then be forgotten? Everyone wants to leave a mark, and everyone wants to be remembered. Whether it’s for loving, winning, being spontaneous, being funny, giving great hugs, whatever..it’s different for all of us. I also think I can safely say the majority of us want to be remembered by a good mark, not a bad one. When sitting in church this past weekend I thought of all the people that would remember me for good. For loving them, and being there for them, for always encouraging, always being a good sport, all that great stuff. The number was pretty high. Yay me, right? Nope, not really. That’s because I then realized I could also think of a few people who might not think the best of me, and who I had left a bad mark on. The number of good marks didn’t really seem to be so significant now that I was thinking of the bad ones. I have to admit this pretty much sucked to realize. I kind of already knew this but I was super stubborn about it. I never really showed negative feelings towards these people but I always felt them. When I would feel them, I always made myself believe it was their fault I had these feelings, therefore, they deserved it. As anyone can probably guess, I was wrong.

Through some of the service I was still trying to convince myself I was allowed to feel that way. My pastor pretty much cleared that up for me though. My mind was going crazy as I was thinking about all these people and situations, and right as I was thinking all those things he began to talk about commitment and how commitment is what has to do with leaving a mark. He said that commitment is all about intentionality and it has to be no matter what commitment. No matter what you do, I’m committed to you. No matter what you say, I’m committed to you. When I really thought about that…there are few very people I can say that about. And that’s definitely not how it should be. I should be able to say I’m like that towards everyone. These are the commitments we talked about:

I am committed to ______ you…

1) LOVING. we have to be 100 percent committed to always, always, always loving the people in our life no matter what. I've never really struggled with this, I knew this. But although I could say I still loved these people, I definitely didn't act the same towards them as I did my friends and family and people I truly, outwardly loved. Something my pastor said that was awesome was that loving never meant agreeing. God never said that you had to agree with what someone is doing just because you love them. Think of all the lame things we do and God's like, "oh you dork, why did you do that!?" but never ONCE did he stop loving us. When I really thought about it people who are struggling and not doing the best need to be loved on a TON! When this happens it can totally be seen that God is shining right through you!

2) FORGIVING. And then it hit. The part I didn't want to hear. Mainly because I am hurt, and I know I have to forgive, but I don't want to. Human, brat, I don't want to forgive this person, or this person, or that person. I just don't. I can sit on my high horse and say to myself "they hurt me"..."I was there for them and they turned their backs on me, my hands are clean." But, my hands are so not clean. They would be if I would just do what God would've done. When I come to him and apologize for doing something, right there, on the spot he forgives me. I certainly don't do that by any means. If I did a few of my relationships would be quite different, and much better off.

Something I would like to point out about this is important. While I was sitting in church wanting to cry and be frustrated because I have to forgive and don't want to, and want to hold a grudge instead, my pastor pointed this out and it helped: Trust and Forgiveness is not the same thing. The second you forgive someone you do not have to trust them. If I really think about it, that is a huge problem for me. I think...if I forgive them that means I say what they did is totally fine and I totally trust them and open up for it to happen again. This is so totally lame and totally wrong! My pastor wasn't saying you will never trust them again but as for right now, it's not required. The fixing of relationships and mending of hearts needs to happen before trust can, but all of that mending and fixing begins with forgiveness.

3) EMPOWERING. This is a huge, huge thing. Once we know we have to love, and we have to forgive, we have to remember that we have, have, haveeee to empower!! With our words, with our prayers, and with our actions. They all go hand-in-hand. Words are huge, I can remember times from years ago where I was empowered with words and how they picked me up and how much it meant to me. Those are great to pull out when you're struggling and need a little boost for a bad day. I always remember the times when I’m really struggling and I get a phone call from a friend saying "hey girl, just calling because I really miss you and love you and think you’re awesome" or a text saying something similar. The reason I remember those so well is because I really needed to hear that so bad and it was beautiful how it happened perfectly. God is pretty awesome about things like that..through scriptures and through putting people in our lives to help us out or say that perfect thing right when it needs to be said. :] Prayer is super powerful to. It's awesome to have people in our lives that we can think about and say "no matter what I know they are praying for me" that's true love and trust greatness. I have people in my life like that and they are SUCH a blessing. The third thing mentioned was actions. We all have people in our life that say “you’re my favorite, I love you more than anything, and you’re my best friend” and then they don’t call, and when you see them they definitely don’t reflect the things that they say. It’s a pretty crappy feeling, I know. That right there is words not followed with actions. But when someone says all those beautiful things to me and then also calls, and loves on me when they see me, it’s great! And then every time I get a text with that in it or a hug from that person and they say that it totally brightens my day because I actually believe it!

It’s lack of loving, and forgiving, and empowering that truly tears us down, and truly does begin to burden us and make us unhappy. I know this first hand. I thought for a while that it’d be better to not forgive certain people, and to just ignore them and not deal with them because for some reason I thought that would make it all go away. But each time that name would come up there would be pain, sometimes even hatred, and it would bring on an unloving mood and bad feelings. It really didn’t do anything except make the issue bigger, and worse. I haven’t been content in quite a few of my relationships for a while. I could never seem to figure out exactly why but I think these things have a lot to do with it. There is a lot of unhappiness and discomfort right now for me in this area but nothing says that it always has to be that way. Realizing these things above have already helped me out a lot.

Hmm.. I guess I leave this blog with a few things….

Just like the Bible tells us that nothing can separate us from God, our love should tell other people that. That absolutely NOTHING can separate them for our love. Just imagine if we lived that way. If our friends, and family, and everyone else we came into contact with knew that we would love them no matter what they did. That’d be so amazing! And I know what that feels like because that’s how God loves….and take it from me…it’s amazing! Ha..

So when you’re thinking about these things…ask yourself…

Is there anything that can separate them from my love?


aaand remember! :

Have a love that loves no matter what and doesn’t love only “if they do ____” or only “if they don’t say ____ “.

We should always be committed to loving, forgiving, and empowering… NO MATTER WHAT!

:]. :].