This Love is Ours

I like all kinds of music. My Ipod is full of 80s classics, contemporary gospel, some Pearl Jam (I know, I know... contradictory to the contemporary gospel), and lots of songs from teenage pop sensations featured on the Disney channel.  My mood usually dictates what I listen to.

Tonight I was walking I had it on shuffle and to be honest I really wasn't even listening to the words.  Sometimes I just like to have noise in the background.  My thoughts were racing... how fast this week was going, things I still needed to do, how hard I'm finding 4th grade math as I'm helping Caleb with his homework.  Life in general is busy, no matter what you do... and it's hard, sometimes.  A lot of the time. 

And then a Taylor Swift song came on and the lyrics really hit me.  "And life makes love look hard
The stakes are high, the water's rough, But this love is ours." See, life doesn't just make love look hard.  Because let's face it, sometimes it is hard.  To quote Wallace, sometimes things get heavy.  Life happens and we get lost in the motions and somehow find ourselves sinking as we grow... people change and circumstances change and we find ourselves lost sometimes. 

The stakes are high.  It's about more that just love, and some people today just don't get that.  It's easy just to get up.  You get your feelings hurt, you see things differently, you don't take time... and before you know it, there you are, not sure how you got where you are and totally unsure on how to get back.  The water's rough, and sometimes the salt water goes up your nose and you find yourself choking...

But then you realize that if you're by yourself, you're lost.  You're not really sure who you are without that other person, and even though you may be seperate you're connected in a way that you're not.  And that love... is yours.  Together. And yes, it's hard and sometimes it's ugly, but it's also beautiful and worth the heart ache.  Because we were made for community and relationships and our whole purpose on this earth is to love each other... even when it gets heavy. Especially when it gets heavy.  And then, somehow, the storm clouds pass over and the water calms and you're standing there in the sun... together. 

"Love is patient.  Love is kind.  Love does not envy, is not boastful, is not conceited, does not act improperly.  is not selfish, is not provoked,  and does not keep a record of wrongs. ⁶ Love finds no joy in unrighteousness but rejoices in the truth.   ⁷ It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. ⁸ Love never ends. " 1 Corinthians 13: 4-8