I’ve Got This

Deniz and I love the movie “Knight and Day”, starring Tom Cruz and Cameron  Diaz.  I understand you may not share this opinion.  Deniz and I have grown accustom to liking movies others hate.  Years ago, we loved  the movie “Joe vs. the Volcano”.  We were singing its praises as we left the theater while those around us were tearing it to shreds.   I was reluctant to see “Knight and Day” when it was released because I thought it was just another fast cars faster women exploitative movie.  I do not endorse Tom’s lifestyle or reckless choices and the movie certainly contained too many senseless deaths.  However, to my surprise there was very little bad language, no illicit sex scenes, and the paring of a middle- aged Tom with an appropriately aged costar was refreshing; two thumbs up.

Ok, so are you worried our blog has become a movie review site?   Don’t be, it is 2am and a short while ago I was writing in my prayer journal when I discovered something about “Knight and Day” which endeared it to  me even more.  Throughout the entire movie Roy, the Tom Cruise Character, is rushing in to save June, Cameron’s character.  They face many dangers together including; a plane crash, a car chase, an inescapable gun battle surrounded by enemies on every side, a fiery missile attack, and a cold hearted assassin.  In every situation Roy is unflappable while June screams hysterically.  In the middle of every chaotic situation Roy reassures June saying, “I’ve got this”, while offering oddly timed compliments like, “that’s a beautiful dress June” or “you really drove well back there June”.  Meanwhile, June is confused and thinks Roy is insane.  She spends much of the movie trying to get away from Roy and the pursuing danger.  Two thirds into the movie, after Roy sacrifices himself by arranging for his own capture, June finally understands how much Roy cares for her safety and protection.  June, free from their relationship, voluntarily embroils herself in Roy’s mission.  A new June emerges.  She is fearless, confident and bold.  She shines with love for Roy and trusts him completely. 

While journaling this morning, God revealed the similarities between my relationship with Jesus and June’s relationship with Roy.  I have spent too many days running from Him, blaming Him for the dangers surrounding me; blind to His efforts to protect me and build me up.  Two thirds into my life I am no longer deaf to His words.  My eyes are open; I see the sacrifice He made to ensure my safety.  I voluntarily seek to embroil myself in His mission to save the lives around me.   I am striving to become fearless, confident and bold.  I want my love for him to shine.  I trust Him completely.  With every challenge, with every unexpected danger I hear His voice saying, “I’ve got this”.   

 ^1-2God, listen to me shout, bend an ear to my prayer.
   When I'm far from anywhere,
      down to my last gasp,
   I call out, "Guide me
      up High Rock Mountain!"

 ^3-5 You've always given me breathing room,
      a place to get away from it all,
   A lifetime pass to your safe-house,
      an open invitation as your guest.
   You've always taken me seriously, God,
      made me welcome among those who know and love you.

 ^6-8 Let the days of the king add up
      to years and years of good rule.
   Set his throne in the full light of God;
      post Steady Love and Good Faith as lookouts,
   And I'll be the poet who sings your glory—
      and live what I sing every day. (Psalm 61, The Message)

 ¹ Hear my cry, O God;
         Attend to my prayer.
 ² From the end of the earth I will cry to You,
         When my heart is overwhelmed;
         Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
       
 ³ For You have been a shelter for me,
         A strong tower from the enemy.
 ⁴ I will abide in Your tabernacle forever;
         I will trust in the shelter of Your wings.  Selah
       
 ⁵ For You, O God, have heard my vows;
         You have given me the heritage of those who fear Your name.
 ⁶ You will prolong the king’s life,
         His years as many generations.
 ⁷ He shall abide before God forever.
         Oh, prepare mercy and truth, which may preserve him!
       
 ⁸ So I will sing praise to Your name forever,
         That I may daily perform my vows. (Psalm 61, New King James Version)


   You who sit down in the High God's presence, spend the night in Shaddai's shadow,
   Say this: "God, you're my refuge.
      I trust in you and I'm safe!"
   That's right—he rescues you from hidden traps,
      shields you from deadly hazards.
   His huge outstretched arms protect you—
      under them you're perfectly safe;
      his arms fend off all harm.
   Fear nothing—not wild wolves in the night,
      not flying arrows in the day,
   Not disease that prowls through the darkness,
      not disaster that erupts at high noon.
   Even though others succumb all around,
      drop like flies right and left,
      no harm will even graze you.
   You'll stand untouched, watch it all from a distance,
      watch the wicked turn into corpses.
   Yes, because God's your refuge,
      the High God your very own home,
   Evil can't get close to you,
      harm can't get through the door.
   He ordered his angels
      to guard you wherever you go.
   If you stumble, they'll catch you;
      their job is to keep you from falling.
   You'll walk unharmed among lions and snakes,
      and kick young lions and serpents from the path.

 ^14-16 "If you'll hold on to me for dear life," says God,
      "I'll get you out of any trouble.
   I'll give you the best of care
      if you'll only get to know and trust me.
   Call me and I'll answer, be at your side in bad times;
      I'll rescue you, then throw you a party.
   I'll give you a long life,
      give you a long drink of salvation!" (Psalm 91, The Message)

 ¹ There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. ² This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”
³ Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
⁴ Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”
⁵ Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. ⁶ That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷ Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
⁹ Nicodemus answered and said to Him, “How can these things be?”
¹⁰ Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things? ¹¹ Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive Our witness. ¹² If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? ¹³ No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven. ¹⁴ And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, ¹⁵ that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁶ For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. ¹⁷ For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
¹⁸ “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. ¹⁹ And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. ²⁰ For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. ²¹ But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.” (John 3:1-21, New King James Version)

Cold Night Shelter

I am proud of my community. Last year, when the people of Tallahassee discovered their neighbors were sleeping outdoors in freezing temperatures they responded by demanding a cold night shelter.  The issue quickly became a political hot potato and by the end of January 2010 a cold night shelter was opened.

I participated in the earliest version of our community's response by helping with transportation.  I continued my outreach schedule during the day and gave a few extra hours to driving people from downtown.  I left the coordination and implementation to our executive director and local politicians.  The shelter functioned, but everyone agreed a better plan was needed for the winter of 2011.  The Homeless Coalition was tasked with coming up with the answer.  After several proposals a plan was approved.  The only thing the new cold night shelter was missing was a manager.

In July, as we began developing Connections, the Cold Night Shelter (CNS) was listed as a potential need to be filled.  We thought we would be established by the time the coldest days hit and we could save the day.  God's plan was different.  The first cold days arrived earlier than expected and with them enough political pressure to crush a small emerging church with grand ideas.

God's plan called for sacrifice and humbleness not grand gestures and fame.  God asked me to step forward to manage the CNS.  We operated two nights last week and expect to operate several nights next week.  My name does not appear in headlines.  I do not get asked for interviews.  I do not control when the shelter is open.  I am simply there to serve humble and grateful people from 7 to 7.  I am confident mountains will move.

I am familiar with this plan.  It is how God has shaped me over the last five years.  When I was sent into the community as a "Missionary to Tallahassee" it wasn't a glamorous assignment, it was a call to become a servant.  Step by step I was asked to lay down my pride and selfish ambitions and learn to serve and obey.  Through this process God's influence has grown and Connections was birthed.  It seems fitting Connections early days of ministry are similar to my own.  It is counter intuitive, counter to the way our world thinks, but servanthood is how God makes the greatest impact.  Jesus came not wrapped in glory and splendor but in swaddling cloths. 

My job is simple.  Greet those I serve with compassion, answer their needs the best I can, and watchover them while they rest.  It sounds like shepherd training.  It sounds like God's version of leadership training.  I am blessed. 

 ¹ And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. ² This census first took place while Quirinius was governing Syria. ³ So all went to be registered, everyone to his own city.
⁴ Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, ⁵ to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. ⁶ So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. ⁷ And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
⁸ Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. ⁹ And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid. ¹⁰ Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. ¹¹ For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. ¹² And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.”
(Luke 2:1-12, New King James Version)

 ¹ Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.
² And supper being ended, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray Him, ³ Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God, ⁴ rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself. ⁵ After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. ⁶ Then He came to Simon Peter. And Peter said to Him, “Lord, are You washing my feet?”
⁷ Jesus answered and said to him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will know after this.”
⁸ Peter said to Him, “You shall never wash my feet!”
Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.”
⁹ Simon Peter said to Him, “Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head!”
¹⁰ Jesus said to him, “He who is bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you.” ¹¹ For He knew who would betray Him; therefore He said, “You are not all clean.”
¹² So when He had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? ¹³ You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. ¹⁴ If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. ¹⁵ For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. ¹⁶ Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. ¹⁷ If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them. (John 13:1-17, New King James Version)

 ⁶ When they arrived, Samuel took one look at Eliab and thought, "Here he is! God's anointed!"
 ⁷ But God told Samuel, "Looks aren't everything. Don't be impressed with his looks and stature. I've already eliminated him. God judges persons differently than humans do. Men and women look at the face; God looks into the heart."
 ⁸ Jesse then called up Abinadab and presented him to Samuel. Samuel said, "This man isn't God's choice either."
 ⁹ Next Jesse presented Shammah. Samuel said, "No, this man isn't either."
 ¹⁰ Jesse presented his seven sons to Samuel. Samuel was blunt with Jesse, "God hasn't chosen any of these."
 ¹¹ Then he asked Jesse, "Is this it? Are there no more sons?"
    "Well, yes, there's the runt. But he's out tending the sheep."
    Samuel ordered Jesse, "Go get him. We're not moving from this spot until he's here."
 ¹² Jesse sent for him. He was brought in, the very picture of health— bright-eyed, good-looking.
    God said, "Up on your feet! Anoint him! This is the one." (1 Samuel 16:6-12, The Message)

Thanksgiving

Good morning Father, I love you.  Thank you for loving me even when I was far away from you. Thank you for Deniz; my bride, my love, my best friend.  Thank you for Jasmine; my better self, my second chance at making better choices.  Thank you for Jenna; my smile, my tenderness. Thank you for Dylan; my innocents, my thoughtfulness. If it were not for these, I would be lost and alone, stranded on an island of despair. Thank you Father for leading me home.

My mind can not comprehend the vastness or intricacies of your creation; what hope can there be of understanding you? I am just a grain of sand on the shore of eternity.  You are infinitely more and yet you call me your child, your friend. What did it cost to bring me near? How much did you sacrifice? How can I ever repay you? Thank you Lord for blessing me and allowing me to know you intimately. Thank you for revealing yourself through Jesus, your word, and your Spirit. Thank you for your promise that one day I will know all of you. 

Thank you Father for your faithfulness. There are times when I lose faith in myself, yet your faith in me is constant. You are omnipotent and never fail, I am fragile and ever failing, yet it is my faith in you which waivers. Thank you for believing in me, for raising me up, for trusting me to care for your loved ones.  I hope you are proud of me and my life reflects your love.   

Marriage

I know the subject of marriage may seem off topic. Most of the people in the homeless community are single. Many were once married and are divorced or widowed. Others, a majority single moms, have never been married. So why talk about marriage? The short answer, God drew my attention to it through conversation, a recent news report, and while reading the Bible.


I am friends with a great couple I will name Aquila and Priscilla. During a conversation this week with Priscilla about marriage I nagged more than I offered wisdom. Aquila and Priscilla are very different from one another, yet compliment each other. They have stood beside each other through several trials and demonstrated deep love in good times and bad. I met Aquila and Priscilla five years ago while they were in their mid-twenties. I knew them before they were together and have witnessed them grow and mature as individuals and as a couple. For the past few years they have lived together; first out of necessity, then out of love. It appears they are in no hurry to be married.  


Aquila and Priscilla are not alone. According to the results of a Pew Report released this week marriage is in decline. In 1960, 68% of all twenty-somethings were married compared to only 26% in 2008. Today, twenty-somethings prefer cohabitation over marriage. 39% of all polled believe marriage is obsolete.


So, what's the deal? Why is the concept of marriage fading? Deniz and I were married our senior year of college. Just like Aquila and Priscilla we loved each other deeply. A chapter in our lives was closing and a new one about to begin. A choice had to be made, travel together or go our separate ways. Marriage was the natural expression of our commitment and willingness to sacrifice for each other. Deniz gave up higher paying more prestigious job opportunities to move to Florida near my parents. I gave up dreams of working for an ad agency in Chicago. We never considered continuing into the next chapter without being married; it was the natural next step. Has the definition of marriage changed over the passed twenty years?  What did God intend marriage to be? Why is it important? Read the scripture below and see how corrupted our culture's current definition of marriage has become.

Ephesians 5:21-33 (New International Version)

Instructions for Christian Households

 ²¹ Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. ²² Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. ²³ For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. ²⁴ Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
 ²⁵ Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her ²⁶ to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, ²⁷ and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. ²⁸ In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. ²⁹ After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— ³⁰ for we are members of his body. ³¹“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” ³² This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. ³³ However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.


When I read this scripture this week I gained a new appreciation and understanding of its meaning. I admit while reading this passage in the past with my own cultural bias, I stumbled over the word "submission". Deniz has always been my equal; stronger in areas where I am weak and weaker in areas I am strong. Is God suggesting wives are less than their husbands? No, our understanding of submission and His meaning are much different.


God desires a deep intimate relationship with us. So much so he sacrificed more than we can imagine to close the gap. Jesus submitted to God's will and laid down His life for us, the church. Marriage requires similar acts, calling us to submit to one another and sacrifice our selfish desires. It is an invitation to experience oneness with each other and with God. To lead, a man must be willing to sacrifice his own will for a greater purpose. To submit a woman must sacrifice her will and follow. The deepest human relationship pales in comparison to God's gift of marriage.


What about the singles? Are they less than those who marry? No, Paul says the best choice is to remain single and focus on developing a deeper relationship with God. However, he acknowledges how difficult it is to remain celibate. When our pursuit of love endangers our relationship with God, marriage is the solution. Celibate singles without the desire to marry develop an intimacy with God in a equal but different way.


Words and ideas God gave to us as a pathway to greater understanding of Him and His love have been corrupted by our culture. Marriage, commitment, submission, and sacrifice have become synonymous with enslavement, oppression, weakness and death. We must fight to restore their true meanings. If we fail, marriage will become obsolete, a way to know God will be lost, and many will suffer. 


For Aquila and Priscilla I pray, may they develop a deeper relationship with each other and with God through marriage; through their oneness God would reveal himself to future generations; that love, commitment, submission, and sacrifice would be given new meaning by their example.

While I was writing this morning my bride came to me. She was singing this song. It expresses how powerful the gifts of marriage and family can be and how through these gifts our intimacy with God grows, enjoy.

   ______________

²⁰ “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; ²¹ that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. ²² And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: ²³ I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.
²⁴ “Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world. ²⁵ O righteous Father! The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. (John 17:20-25, New King James Version)

¹ Now, getting down to the questions you asked in your letter to me. First, Is it a good thing to have sexual relations? ^2-6Certainly—but only within a certain context. It's good for a man to have a wife, and for a woman to have a husband. Sexual drives are strong, but marriage is strong enough to contain them and provide for a balanced and fulfilling sexual life in a world of sexual disorder. The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality—the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to "stand up for your rights." Marriage is a decision to serve the other, whether in bed or out. Abstaining from sex is permissible for a period of time if you both agree to it, and if it's for the purposes of prayer and fasting—but only for such times. Then come back together again. Satan has an ingenious way of tempting us when we least expect it. I'm not, understand, commanding these periods of abstinence—only providing my best counsel if you should choose them. ⁷Sometimes I wish everyone were single like me—a simpler life in many ways! But celibacy is not for everyone any more than marriage is. God gives the gift of the single life to some, the gift of the married life to others.
 ^8-9I do, though, tell the unmarried and widows that singleness might well be the best thing for them, as it has been for me. But if they can't manage their desires and emotions, they should by all means go ahead and get married. The difficulties of marriage are preferable by far to a sexually tortured life as a single. (1 Corinthians 7:1-9, The Message)

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1802/decline-marriage-rise-new-families

Love

Everybody can be great.  Because anybody can serve.  You don't have to have a college degree to serve.  You don't have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve.... You don't have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve.  You only need a heart full of grace.  A soul generated by love.  ~Martin Luther King, Jr.


Deniz sent me this quote from Martin Luther King Jr. a few weeks ago. It captures the heart of Connections. As I began talking to God about our leadership team my mind kept returning to it. What makes a leader in God's eyes?


The world says a leader is powerful, clever, well spoken, attractive, popular, charismatic, shrewd, wealthy and influential. These are not necessarily negative attributes, but are they how God measures a leader? Jesus provides a different standard. He was not physically attractive or influential. He was common without worldly wealth, not the leader the people of his time were expecting. However, he was and is the greatest leader the world will ever know. Jesus' leadership was born through His love for the Father and for us. All other attributes flowed from that single point.


The same week I received the quote from Deniz, I was studying John's letters to the churches of Asia Minor. Through these letters it is clear the early church was grappling with the same question, "who is qualified to lead? There are many who want to lead, and many differing ideas, how do we judge authenticity?"  John directs them to the standard set by Jesus:


¹⁶ This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. ¹⁷ If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be that person? ¹⁸ Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.  1 John 3:16


Jesus led through his willingness to serve and he directs us to do the same. God can provide the gifts and talents needed to succeed, but we must choose to love. Without love all our efforts are fruitless. Through love nothing is impossible.


This week I sat at the table of our first leadership meeting. As I surveyed the room I was pleased. We are diverse; our skin color as broad a spectrum as our ages.  Men serving alongside women.  Each growing in our relationship with God; each still a work in progress.  Our talents and gifts are different but we share one attribute, love. I could not help but smile as I thought, "this is what leadership looks like from God's eyes."


 ^2-6The servant grew up before God—a scrawny seedling,
   a scrubby plant in a parched field.
There was nothing attractive about him,
   nothing to cause us to take a second look.
He was looked down on and passed over,
   a man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand.
One look at him and people turned away.
   We looked down on him, thought he was scum.
But the fact is, it was our pains he carried—
   our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us.
We thought he brought it on himself,
   that God was punishing him for his own failures.
But it was our sins that did that to him,
   that ripped and tore and crushed him—our sins!
He took the punishment, and that made us whole.
   Through his bruises we get healed.
We're all like sheep who've wandered off and gotten lost.
   We've all done our own thing, gone our own way.
And God has piled all our sins, everything we've done wrong,
   on him, on him. (Isaiah 53:2-3, The Message)


³⁶ “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”
³⁷ Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ ³⁸ This is the first and great commandment. ³⁹ And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ ⁴⁰ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:36-40, New King James Version)

 ¹ If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. ²If I speak God's Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, "Jump," and it jumps, but I don't love, I'm nothing. ^3-7If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.

   Love never gives up.
   Love cares more for others than for self.
   Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
   Love doesn't strut,
   Doesn't have a swelled head,
   Doesn't force itself on others,
   Isn't always "me first,"
   Doesn't fly off the handle,
   Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
   Doesn't revel when others grovel,
   Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
   Puts up with anything,
   Trusts God always,
   Always looks for the best,
   Never looks back,
   But keeps going to the end.
 ^8-10Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.
 ¹¹When I was an infant at my mother's breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.
 ¹²We don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!
 ¹³But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love. (1 Corinthians 13, The Message)