Gotta love that Lisa-Jo. Here we go. It’s Five-Minute Friday:
[T]here is a weight to this word: community. It gets stuck in my mouth a little. Like peanut butter. Which I love. But, also, it makes me a little worried, too, if I’m honest. I love it, and I also worry about the consequences of it, what it will require of me. If I’ll get sucked in too much and feel guilty about indulging this heart of mine, later.
I’ve been in so many groups — the first before children, when my husband and I joined three other couples and shared our lives for a good almost two years — before the Silicon Valley bubble crashed, and then everyone moved away. And then, with our first baby born, I joined a mother’s group, and I thought I would die if I missed a Tuesday and couldn’t see them. It was the being together, not so much what we shared but the love of the Father helping us to physically get there, together, despite all crazy motherhood obstacles, that made our hearts sing.
And then the couples group — four other couples that each had two kids, and then almost all had three, all our kids the exact same age — that we shared our hearts with for over five years. {Or was it longer, friends?} And that ended . . . as parenting seemed to sap us dry for a bit, calendars pulling us each away. It seemed we had forgotten how to fight for each other.
And then there is My Girls – and here – where it all begins again. Community that sings to my heart and heals and where there is no pressure to be a certain way. The Spirit leads, and that, there, is the beauty, the magic sauce, the sticky wonderfulness of it all. We don’t have to do a thing to stay connected. And that is what I finally learned, through it all.
He brings the community. It is only my job to listen close and trust that these friends He gathers up are fine to love, and He will show me how to do it too, and trust with His heart, no matter how sticky it gets. He wasn’t afraid to get messy, His hand in the jar. I want to be just like Him.
STOP
I want to add that I am overwhelmingly blessed by this community, this one, right here. He gathers us up in this place, all together. We are His girls. I hope you feel all that sticky yumminess that He brings, here, too.
