As February Ends
This was written a few weeks back on love day. As February comes to end - let’s keep loving.
God fervently placed on my heart to focus on why we have the ability, the gift, to love. My Lilly girl, Lilly love, really knows. She truly feels the gift of Love, twiced (mark that’s for you). We have the gift, the heart, mind, and soul, to feel what we feel and then give it away. Where does the power of love originate and how do we give truly give Love?
The first time Lilly was gifted blood from a donor, it hit me as mom in a whole new way as new drips of blood flowed into her, the power and life-saving blood that only comes from the shed blood of Christ. Without His life and death and sacrificed agony of dripping blood, we cannot truly Love.
I shared recently thanks to Facebook memories, scroll down just a bit if you wish, about this day nearly three years ago. About how a blood transfusion can seem minor in ways, easy, routine, but it's never any of these to her or me or Mark or Mamaw or Grammy or anyone who truly needs blood. Nothing is really minor when it comes to Love.
"What can wash away my sin - nothing but the blood of Jesus"
"What can make me whole again - nothing but the blood of Jesus"
Lilly love was just gifted a second gift of blood from a donor here on earth. I wish I knew who. That we could exchange an eternal thank you. God does that for us. A friend shared, "isn't it amazing that blood cannot be replicated by humans. Only given. We are saved by blood. It gives us life and it can only be used to help someone else when given (as a gift) by another person. What a beautiful reminder of the spiritual and intricate depth of God’s creation and Love for us.”
1 John 3:16, boldly, “By this we know what love is: Jesus laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers”.
On this love day, give the cute hearts, the fun-dip, the flowers, the handmade or American Greetings, the intimate gift in marriage, please do because we can only celebrate Love because of His shed blood on calvary. Please read that again. And if you feel the thump in your heart from Christ’s Spirit, go give some blood to your local donor unit, or give a card to thank, as Lilly said when she got her IV removed, those super heroes of doctors, nurses, and teams that help. We’d appreciate that.
But these gifts really are the minor, temporary things. They don't complete us. If they are given in vain, or temporary hope, a replication, or of some holiday, they really are only a mist. Just like our bodies, our blood, it isn’t our own, it’s a gift. Our life, a beautiful, created, intricate gift from God, a gift created for the purpose to share in and of His Love, our only reason of this life. We have the gifted choice to love in temporary or eternally.
Where does the love you give originate?
“For God so loved the world that he gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16
We can only truly give Love because of God and the gift of His Son, living a perfect life, dying a perfect death. In the drips of His blood:
“Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit”. John 19
I pray that each day now that Lilly’s donors know Christ, that their families, and friends do. It’s intricately beautiful. His remembrance. Jesus, rising perfectly planned and promising to return again for all of us sinners. In need of His blood.
If you’re giving in a little love just because you have the ability to feel, please lay down. I am. If you’re unsure of why you have the longing to love, repentance is always here and His Love is always true. We can only Love by believing that Jesus is the Son of God, that I am a sinner, in need of His mercy and grace, of His shed and live-giving blood.
He already completely transfused for us on calvary. On that old rugged cross. He already wins. He already shouldered all our battles. Lay down. He already, already, already did it all for us. Satan never gets the victory but we do have the choice to worldly love of Satan or truly Love of God, eternally.
You know how you see those people and they just shine His love? They have His air. His breath. His radiance. His peace.
Lilly, when she needs blood, accepts it, receives it, she feels it. She is renewed. Her hair gets more shiny, her face brightens, her lips fill of that beautiful pink, her energy boosts, her purpose to sing and dance and be and worship is abundant and alive.
I pray that God uses this to speak to you in some way. Believing that you are created as His Beloved to share the gift of His love. Daughters and sons. Sinners designed to need Him. If you're unsure, His desire is abundant life for you through His Son, our IV, our gift, our only way back to our Father. Whether new or old, or in-between, we’re all in need of His eternally whole and complete, life-saving blood.
