I Lived this Weekend...

Life, what’s that all about?
in John 10:10 Jesus says that “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

but what does full life look like? what does it mean? Well I don’t have any answers more accurate than Douglas Adam’s infamous 42 from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy but I do have some thoughts.

Which times in your life stand out the most? The Good times like weddings and epic holidays, surprises and unexpected gifts. How about the hard times? Those weeks or months when you didn’t know how you were going to cover rent, or maybe where you were going to sleep that night never mind what you’d eat when you woke up.

Well doesn’t it seem like those good times are often a result of the bad times? Something small at just the right time, when you’re feeling down, picks you so far up that you’ll never forget just how perfect it was.

I remember one christmas that we as a family were tight on money, we wouldn’t be doing gifts that year, and a tree wasn’t in the picture either. Then, one day when we came home from somewhere, I don’t even remember what we’d been doing, but that’s not the important part. The important part is that there was a rather large box on the door step and inside that box was a whole heap of food, Christmas food, and not just the essentials, but the extra little bits also. AND there was also cash, cash with a note designating it for presents. 
Just the right thing at the right time....

WOW. God promises abundant life and He care about what we care about.

For me, this weekend was abundant life. I love my friends, and the more you open yourself to love the larger the door is that hurt and paint can enter through. Man did I feel some hurt, but I didn’t turn and run, I didn’t even close the door. In fact my response was to open the door even more...“Hey man this hurts” And in sharing that with my friends, we drew closer.

That was just the beginning. The rest of the weekend was just as up and down. Laughing, crying, having fun, mourning, loving, being loved, making choices and sharing life. Meeting new friends and saying good bye to others.

This weekend I lived, or at least tasted living. Here’s how I know that. During the good times and the bad, the fun and the sad, I could say that God is good. The freedom to live was tangible for me; I could move and dance with a smile on my face even though there was sadness in my heart. Because life is not about waiting for the storms to pass, it’s about learning to dance in the rain.

It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all
-Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem In Memoriam