Drenching love

I remember well the few months I attended school in Hawaii as a young girl. My mother would meet me after class, my little sister in the stroller tagging along as we waded through the streets after a warm winter rain, the type you could stand in and feel as though you were in a comfortable shower.

How very different from my home state, often sitting in the dry coldness of a sun without warmth waiting for class to begin, my knees gathered up under my skirt to keep them from the penetrating cold.

In the Southwest we live in a climate that is categorized as being "semi-arid". When there is a drought, as in years not too far past, rainfall is scarce; weeks may go by in the hot summer without a drop of rain. A daughter of mine visited relatives in the Northeast and couldn't help but spend time sitting on a bench in the yard during rain storms, allowing the water to soak her clothes and drip down her long eye lashes.

I don't realize how much my love and affection means to my children, until I remember times in my own childhood when it seemed expressions of affection were rationed out to me like water in the middle of a desert. My heart was blistered and pealing from my extreme thirst for a reassuring hug.

Above all, childhood should be a time when love is abundantly flowing, like standing beneath a waterfall in the tropics.

Of course none of us mean to do it--we get busy, life gets complicated, or we go through a season of illness, etc.

But if love were food, and we could observe how well our children were being fed by it, we might be shocked at how malnourished they truly are.

It was what impressed me about my husband. He knew how to express his love and attention, not just to me, but to the little children we came across in our courting. He could make a little girl feel like a princess, and so he did with me, and so he does with each little girl we have in our house.

Of course, a person can be affectionate without being full of love--it is a way to manipulate and control, masking the malevolent or narcissistic true intent. Wounds like these are the worst to recover from.

Conversely, when love for a child is without any expectation of return, when it arises from self-abandonment and deep concern, and is filled with delight, then it is life-giving and more necessary than anything else we could possibly give.

Sometimes we check ourselves and see that we are coming up short--we have been missing opportunities to shower our children with love, and we kick ourselves a bit. But love like this is not natural as much as it is cultivated. We are not like God, who is Love. We are sinful people with selfish desires. Our love must come from His source, and our mind, will, and emotions need to be brought under the Spirit's control.

Love cannot be kept in a bucket, it must ebb and flow through us like water through a hose or faucet. It must first come from heaven the source of all love. I never understood love like this until I was changed, renewed in my spirit because of the sacrifice of One who is most beautiful and holy, the Lord Jesus. He, who is Love, freely allowed God's love to flow in torrents through His sacrifice and embrace all the "...weary and heavy-laidened..." of the world.

So I have to spend time on my face, shutting the door to my secret place with the Almighty. There He, as the Divine Physician, performs heart surgery, and I soon come to realize those things which are in need of repair in my doings with others, and in my thinking and feeling as well. And as I meditate in His Word I find more of what I need to fix and align my soul so I am free from my fleshly hindrances and once again able (by faith) to operate in true affection.

Being offended in my husband, children, neighbor or relative, can interrupt that supernatural flow of God's love.

Being too caught up in the "cares of this life" is another way I can let opportunities slip away--I must remind myself that the greatest influence I possess in the affairs of this world are right here in my own sphere, with the very people I see each and every day.

Worry can work on me, with the fear to produce anger and irritability. Concerns about money, or perhaps someone I love who is suffering in some way, can rob me of my ability to kiss the boo-boo of my toddler or listen patiently to the trials of my 12-year-old. Undo care keeps me from appreciating the glow of sunlight on the blond, fuzzy head of my baby and distracts me from the laughter and celebration of life all around me.

Too much reading, or computer time, or crafting, or talking on the phone can ensure that I do not have time to rain expressions of my benevolence on my own family.

And when I don't take care of my body--not taking the time or discipline for proper sleep, exercise or norishment--then I am unable to offer much of anything to anyone else.

I can also become a complainer, grumbling in my own unthankfulness. Speaking out positive, thankful words most helps me then--"I love cleaning my house", "I love changing diapers, it gives me a chance for some one-on-one with my baby", "I love washing the dishes, it is relaxing and gives me time to think", "I love sitting next to you, Sweet Little Boy, and reading the same story for the 4th time this week", etc.

If we find ourselves walking around, navel-gazing and thinking, "No one loves or appreciates me", this is the precise moment we most need to express these very things to someone else. The words of St. Francis of Assisi are very helpful here--"It is in giving that we now receive". The paradox of the Gospel is that we are healed when we help others to heal. The love we lacked as children, we receive when we give to our own children freely, and there are repairs to the brokeness of our own psyche that occur when we abandon our desires for the needs of others.

I like the words of that old 70's song, "Shower the people you love with love, show them the way you feel".

What things are in the way of our love today?

We must let them go, lay them at His wounded feet.