Lara Love's Blog, page 398

Serving God in Everyday Life

Some might call me crazy, and I would have to agree. I am crazy for Christ, and I have a boundless, uninhibited, unrestrained, wildly passionate desire to share the love of Jesus Christ whenever I have the opportunity. I have learned through the years that serving God in my everyday life means keeping my heart and ears ever attuned to opportunities to share the Gospel while ministering the Lord's love to a world in need. Some might say I have the heart of an evangelist, and I would have to ag...

Are You GRIEVING? Hide Under the Cover

Dedicated to Annie.....
When a friend of mine, inundated and overwhelmed with grieving a monumental loss along with another incredibly trying challenge and all of her usual responsibilities, shared with me that she just wanted to crawl under the covers and never come out, I could so easily understand. I have grieved enormous losses, baby losses, and everything in between, and along with my other life challenges have oftentimes wanted to seek the refuge of hiding under the covers - and sometime...

Beauty in Hard Places

There is something about pain that can bring out the worst in us, don't you think? And there is something about walking through hard places that can make us feel ugly, and make the world around us look ugly also, don't you think? There is something about the darkness of our hard places that makes us forget to hang onto the light, don't you think? Do you ever feel like you're drowning in hard places, and like the life and breath are getting sucked out of you? Oh, if you could only come up for...

Who Said LOVE Has to Be BIG?

Who said love has to be big? We humans came about that  notion, didn't we? Love has to be extravagant, lush, lavish, enormous, decidedly, abundantly, monumentally BIG enough that people will take notice, right? If we really love, our love should be obvious, big enough for a front page story, or at the very least for somebody to see? For others to recount? For us to feel worthy, big enough, loving enough. Somehow, someway, we humans have come to this idea that our love should be worth mak...

All the Pretty Colors

When was the last time you stopped in the busy, rushing, whirring, crazy fast tracks of your life to take a good, thankful look around you to notice all the countless colors God created? As I strolled down the tiny country road I live on with paralyzed Miss Mercy gleefully scurrying forward in her wheelchair, I looked all around me amid this beautiful, hot, sunshine-resplendent spring day and realized the colors God uses merely for tree leaves alone are manifold. When I shifted my eyes from t...

PARALYZED DOG INSPIRES HOPE AND LIGHT

Paralyzed dog Miss Mercy never complains. Not ever. She is always full of joy. She has dragged herself around ever since she got hit by a car and found herself locked inside a rural Georgia shelter where she would almost certainly have been euthanized. Her pain was excruciating, and my five-hour trip to go pick her up out of the shelter was followed by the emphatic verdicts by two reputable veterinarians: EUTHANIZE. They simply could not see past her pain and spinal cord injury. Neither could...

GOD'S NOT A QUITTER

Have you ever stopped to think that God's not a quitter? I hate that word. Quitter. I hate it because it's a word that has stuck with me for decades - ever since it was first spoken over my life by someone very influential in my life. I was criticized. I was judged. I was called a quitter. And for someone as tenacious and committed as I can be, it was a tough word to hear. And still is. It is a word I wish I could say never defines me.

And though I suppose it never actually defines me, there a...

Use Your Story for God's Glory

If you think transparency is just for the sake of bringing our junk into the light so God can heal it, think again. If you want God to use your story for His glory, then you may just come to find that transparency isn't just for you. It's for all those who might be drawn to the Lord through what God has done in your life. So the next time you're tempted to hold back your story because you're too shy, too embarrassed, too ashamed, too private, too averse to thinking about the hard stuff again,...

Tired FROM Praying

I was trying to figure out why I was so exhausted as I lay sprawled across my bed at an unusually late hour for a nap and an unusually early hour to go to bed for the night. Was it caring for the 17 mostly special needs and senior rescued dogs in my care, a number of whom have health issues and/or medication needs right now? Surprisingly, no. Was it all the driving I did this week, especially some city driving I have grown to really not like? No. Was it the people I ministered to over the pho...

Big Storm, Little Faith....

Do you know what I love about the story of the disciples who panicked in the middle of the storm and woke up Jesus from His sleep to save them only to be rebuked by Jesus for their little faith and big fear? They may have been low on faith, but they knew to run to Jesus to be saved. And even though Jesus rebuked them for their fear, He still brought calm to the storm. I have days where I am so very low on faith, but the most important thing of all is that I remember who is Lord. Jesus. And no...