Lots of Love and Bob Dylan

Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. - Romans 12:9-10

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.  It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. - Romans 3:23-26

I am thankful for a God who loved perfectly and has sent his Spirit to buttress and edify me when I stumble and continue to point me back to the Cross and the ultimate display of love.   Knowing his love for me on this day of love reminds me how I should love others.

Today I and every day I am thankful...


11.  For God's perfect example of what it means to Love

12. For my marriage and God's presence in my marriage and for a silly holiday providing an excuse to remind each other that we still love one another.

The idea that ‘being in love’ is the only reason for remaining married really leaves no room for marriage as a contract or promise at all. If love is the whole thing, then the promise can add nothing; and if it adds nothing, then it should not be made. The curious thing is that lovers themselves, while they remain really in love, know this better than those who talk about love. As Chesterton pointed out, those who are in love have a natural inclination to bind themselves by promises. Love songs all over the world are full of vows of eternal constancy. The Christian law is not forcing upon the passion of love something which is foreign to that passion’s own nature: it is demanding that lovers should take seriously something which their passion of itself impels them to do...But, of course, ceasing to be ‘in love’ need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense — love as distinct from ‘being in love’ — is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriages) the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God. They can have this love for each other even at those moments when they do not like each other; as you love yourself even when you do not like yourself. They can retain this love even when each would easily, if they allowed themselves, be ‘in love’ with someone else. ‘Being in love’ first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise. it is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it.

C.S. Lewis - Mere Christianity

 

Happy 11th

This is one of the many reasons I love my fella

13. For Harper Ann's desire to march to the beat of her own drum. 

Notice that everyone else is clapping and participating, meanwhile, in Harper Ann land...

14.  For the sisterly bond that I can see forming between these girls

15. For signing day conversations with Jonathan

16. That my kids have a good dentist

I was cleaning the bathroom the other day and found myself trying desperately to remember what day it was I asked Holt to help me put the groceries away

17.  That Jonathan had such a good hunting season and that it brings him so much joy and that it is only a few months long

Jonathan got me some jewelry this season

18.  That Jane Cannon's personality is and has been such a happy one

19.  that Holt is old enough to help me keep an eye on Jane Cannon - for example, the other day when I heard him say, "Jane Cannon, how did you get up there?" 


 20. For Bob Dylan