In Reach...

I recently was privileged to join my daughter, Bella on her field trip to the apple orchard. I hate to admit that I have lived in the upstate of South Carolina my entire life, yet THIS was my first trip to an orchard. We walked through the orchard that spanned for acre upon acre and picked as many apples as we could fit in our bags. We found that we had to walk out pretty far to make our way to the trees that Bella and her friends could actually reach the apples from. The trees toward the front part of the orchard had been picked over so much, that the only apples remaining were at the very tip top and couldn't be reached by the small Kindergarteners! Quite a walk through the orchard, but thankfully we had some yummy fruit to snack on for the long walk back to the playground, where their energy suddenly spiked once more! We had so much fun that day! We loved it so much that we decided to take the entire family back with us. A couple weeks later, we packed up the entire family to head up the mountain for some yummy apples. We happened to bump into a problem though....we went a few days too late! The produce stand was still open, but apple picking season had already ended. What a bummer!

We still enjoyed some apple doughnuts and a day in the mountains looking at all the beautiful fall trees, but our dilemma reminded me of a quote I had once heard:

"Love is a fruit in season at all times, and within reach of every hand."   ~Mother Teresa

How true this is.

As Christians, we often throw around a lot of phrases that through the years, have somehow became part of our doctrine. One that I have recently come to hate is the comment regarding how hard it is to love certain people.  "God bless their hearts, but they are so hard to love." (That was my southern approach!) While I agree that there are people in this world that tend to shun any love we might show, it doesn't mean that loving them should be hard for us. Love is always in reach, and always in season. Love is often the first attribute that will draw an unbeliever to us, that we might share Christ with them, but how often do we tire of showing love to those we deem undeserving?

I'm so glad that Christ doesn't give up on me because I'm sometimes "hard to love". I'm also very thankful that he gave us the ability to feel and show His love to others. I want to be responsible with this ability. May I reach the unreachable with the powerful LOVE of Christ. Let my loving actions speak louder than my inexpressible words! May His greatness be evident in my life!

1 Corinthians 13

¹ If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. ³ If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;^[a] but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.

 ⁴ Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud ⁵ or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. ⁶ It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. ⁷ Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.

 ⁸ Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages^[b] and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! ⁹ Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! ¹⁰ But when full understanding comes, these partial things will become useless.

 ¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. ¹² Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.^[c] All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.

 ¹³ Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.

SHOW SOME LOVE! 

Messy Monday Link Up

Each Monday, we host a linkup here at The Evatt's Beautiful Mess!

Fellow bloggers may link up one of their favorite post from the previous week.

Monday's are usually a dreaded day, but our goal is to share encouragement on this seemingly gloomy day, thus making it beautiful!

If you choose to link up, please use the Messy Monday picture, or the Evatt's Beautiful Mess button to link back to our site!

Let's share from the abundance of our hearts and rejoice with one another.
If you do link up, be sure to check out some of the other linked blogs and show some love to fellow bloggers! 

Linked With: