Urban Idealist

Jesus said, “I have come so that you may have life and have it to the full.”

This past weekend we got to spend some time in Amsterdam with our friends the Grafs…who embody abundant and full living. There are the exterior signs of their life being full: a family of 7, a never ending stream of guests, a fridge full of food waiting to be put together in one of Laina’s creations…

But there is also a spiritual fullness about their family…in grace, in wisdom, in the love and affection they have for each other, and in the generosity that overflows to others.

Jesus also said it’s in the giving away of our lives that we end up truly finding our lives…I think that this is why the Grafs are the way they are. They never stop giving and are committed to generosity…even when times are not fiscally flying high.

Hanging out over the weekend was a real encouragement…I saw how it’s not necessarily in the huge things that our ‘joy is made complete’, but it’s in the willingness to be generous moment by moment, choice by choice. An attitude that desires to put others before myself. A deeper understanding that Jesus’ model of becoming a servant wasn’t just to prove a point…but it was an actual way of living.

I’ve tried so hard to find myself by gaining things…knowledge, possessions, experience…I hope to continue to learn that it is only through spontaneous and abundant generosity that I will truly find myself…

I also came across this passage (Isaiah 58:6-8) to reaffirm what God showed me this weekend

Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?

Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter-
when you see the naked, to clothe him,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear…

Slap that down with Jesus words…

You are the light of the world…