Well, the first thing I learned was that I complain more than I thought I did. The longest I've gone without moving my bracelet was 2 days, and I think that had more to do with me staying at home by myself than any real virtue on my part. Hard to complain when the only one listening is the dog! lol
What has blessed me more than anything in this little experiment is meditating on God's lovingkindness. I stumbled across Psalms 136 again doing this study. Once I read it, I went "I remember this Psalm" from when I spent a couple years studying the Psalms. It's this awesome chapter and every single verse ends with, "his lovingkindness is everlasting" or if you use a KJV, "his love endures forever."
I got goosebumps as I read through this Psalm - every verse ends with the proclamation that "His love endures forever." No matter what is going on, "his love endures forever."
It's such a hugely comforting thought to me - no matter what is going on, no matter how I feel, no matter what dumb thing I do - HIS lovingkindness is everlasting; HIS loved endures forever. Wow. That's all I have for that one - wow!
The second thing that hit me again was that truth and lovingkindness go together. Every day, as I looked at all the verses that contained the word lovingkindness, over and over it was tied to truth.
In other words, God's lovingkindness towards me is not because He doesn't really see me and all the ugliness that is in the nooks and crannies of my soul. He sees all that - He sees completely truth but His lovingkindness is still abundantly poured out on me.
The other thing I saw was various versions of this phrasing, "The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness." I think I saw this over a dozen times (now I am curious and will have to go back to actually count - I'm nerdy like that!).
What another huge comfort to me - God's anger is slow to kindle. That's a good thing because I tend to be a ssslllooowwww learner.
There is a verse, I think it is in Micah but I could be wrong, that talks about God delighting over us. I got a glimpse of this last night at work.
For the most part, I enjoy my work at Sylvan. Every once in a while, I get a difficult child. When I see their name on the board listed under me, I sort of cringe. (unlike God, I don't abound in lovingkindness most of the time). Last night, I got one of those "difficult" children. I decided that I was going to jolly him into good behavior.
He is adorably cute, but spent the first 20 minutes zipped up in his coat with only a hand or an eyeball visible. Of course, he thought this was hilariously funny. I did not.
After my other student left (she informed me she felt like throwing up at which point I promptly sent her to the bathroom and used long handled tongs to pick up her books and things from the table), I finally got his cute little face to appear out of its zippered cave.
As I was able to devote my full attention to this little guy, something happened. He got excited about doing well. The more I praised him and gave him tokens, the more excited he got. (we give small plastic tokens for doing work that can be saved up and then turned in for various toys).
Just to give you an idea of the change - the first hour he got 6 tokens. The second hour, he got 22 tokens! He was so excited. He kept saying, "I'm working real good aren't I - what's your name again?"
Not only was he working well, but suddenly, he was mannerly and respectful. He said "yes ma'am" and "no ma'am." Another teacher who was nearby joked by asking me what I had drugged him with.
The thing was, by the time he left he was so pleased with his hard work and good behavior, I hardly had to convince him at all. He gave me an exuberant hug on the way out the door, after happily showing me his very cool toy he was able to buy with all of his tokens. Again, he said, "I did really good didn't I?" To which I could honestly reply, "You did awesome!"
The thing was, it was a lot of fun for me to delight over this little guy's good behavior and hard work. It was even more fun because he has a history of being difficult.
How much more does God delight over you or me when we finally "get" it and do what He wants us to do? His lovingkindness splashes out and over us, giving us joy.
I'm so glad I serve a God that has such great lovingkindness toward me that we can delight in each other.
~ Blessings, Bronte
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