love your neighbor as yourself//getting over "me"

 The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” ~Mark 12:31

the greatest of things that God calls us to, and how ridiculously i fail.

 simply because i am constantly consumed with me.  at any moment of any given day you will find me thinking about myself and my problems and my dreams and my discomforts and my searching for making my life better.

blech!  it sound's awful, but it's true.  i am so incredibly selfish.  i'm sickened by the amount of time and energy i spend on how i feel.  as i pour into God's Word more and more, i grow increasingly convicted by my "me" ways.

i need to get over it.  i need to remember that i am not the second, let alone first important thing in my life.

the more i think and meditate on His Word, the more I am inclined to think beyond me.

and it gets me thinking and living toward this idea of others.  it opens my mind and heart to a world other than me.

a world where others are hurting, and longing, and praying, and wondering, and asking, and are hungry and so desperately in need of hope.

this calling on our lives, this second most important thing we are implored to do is really not so hard.

"love your neighbor as yourself."

well, we know i love myself.  can i love another in a similar way?

i know i don't need to look far to find my neighbor.  to find someone in need of love, a big God-kind of love, those people are everywhere i turn.

am i loving them?

am i loving them in a way that doesn't scream, "look at me!"?

i'm so selfish, that when i am being loving or kind, somewhere inside of me i am hoping someone will see and notice and think about how great i am.

isn't it an awful kind of selfishness?  i get so involved in "me" that i can't even forget about myself when i am trying to love my neighbor as myself.  so, in all honesty, i recognize that i am so far from living out this "love your neighbor as yourself" thing.

but i think it's something i can do.

i want to be in a place where the only attention and approval i crave is from God Himself.

i want to care only about Him seeing what i am doing and knowing i only do what i do to please Him.

i want integrity and humility to be the words that define the essence of who i am.

i think i always thought these are the kind of things you just become when you decide to follow Christ wholeheartedly.

but in reality, like with anything, it takes work.  you have to go to school and be committed to hard work, diligent in classes and disciplined for years in order to earn that degree.

the same is true for becoming a professional, getting a tight bod, achieving excellence in any arena.  it takes dedication and hard work.  it moves beyond the decision to achieve and become these things.

there's work involved.  and thankfully, with the guidance, love, grace, and wisdom of the Good Teacher, it is possible.

the more i invest in a wholehearted pursuit of Him, the likelihood lessons that i am my first concern at any given moment.

and that is a good thing.  a very good thing.  because at this point in my life, i'm getting quite a bit sick of me and my supposed needs.  i am learning that i need less than i thought.  i am learning that when i look at my neighbor their needs are more important than mine.

so today i pray for my neighbor, the kaur, in indonesia. i pray for the ones across the world that suffer, the ones next door, and those that cross my path.  i pray that somehow, some way, today they experience God's love in a radical and intimate way.