Frog City RV Park, Duson, Louisiana
This is love; not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. ~ I John 4:10
While I intend to fill you in on some of the goings on during our first week at home, I want to begin with a message relating to the 4th Sunday in Advent. I know. It’s too late. But the truth is, it’s never too late to talk about Love. That was the theme for the 4th Sunday.
The word ‘love’ and its various tenses occurs 751 times in the NIV translation of the Bible. The apostle John, uses it just over 100 times in his gospel account and first epistle alone. And three times, Jesus instructs us to first love God and then one another. The first use of the word in the Old Testament, appears in Genesis 22:2 – when Abraham is told to sacrifice his son. The first time in the New Testament is Matthew 5:43 (and 44-45) during Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount as He tells us to not only love our neighbors, but our enemies as well. Because God does.
I’d say God thinks love is pretty important.
Over and over we’re told to love, because God loves us. Because He IS Love.
But God demonstrates His own Love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. ~ Romans 5:8
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. ~ I John 4:8
We’re even told to love our enemies. But how are we supposed to do that? The apostle Paul tells us in Romans 12 that we should do nice things for our enemies, and by doing that, it’s like ‘heaping burning coals upon their heads’. And while that doesn’t sound very nice, it just means that it makes them feel uncomfortable or convicted for behaving as our enemy, or second-guessing their assessment of us.
We also need to understand the definition of that kind of love. It’s not a feeling. Our Pastor, Mike Castelli from The Chapel in Green (Ohio), has taught us a wonderful definition of what love really is:
“A commitment to actions seeking the well-being of another, characterized by a willingness to forfeit one’s rights or privileges for the sake of another.”
And that’s exactly what Jesus did for us. He sacrificed His rights and privileges as the Son of God to come to us in the form of a baby, grew up and taught us and died as a human, for our sake. To save us from the wrath of God, as payment for our sins.
Though He was God, He did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, He gave up His divine privileges; He took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When He appeared in human form, He humbled Himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross.
Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave Him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. ~ Philippians 2:6-11
Silly us. We thought we were just going to get on a plane and fly home.
Although it didn’t happen quite the way we planned, it was probably what we should have expected. However, within the not-so-great unexpected, God still saw fit to provide blessings.
We hired our first Uber! Once Blaine figured it out, it truly was super easy! Just as our sister-in-law, Donna explained. There was even an app that showed us exactly where he was as he came down the street. The driver showed up, and was friendly, offering us hospitality in his pick-up truck. It was a piece of cake.
The Lafayette airport was practically empty and only had four gates and one waiting room. Word to the wise though ….. do NOT wear anything with sparkles in the fabric. (I’d chosen a ‘Christmas-y’ sweater with metallic silver threads running through it) The x-ray machine doesn’t like it and I had to be patted down. The TSA agent told me where she had to touch, and then asked if I wanted a private screening. I opted to just stay there and get it over with, while others went on around me and she. And poor Blaine had to gather all our stuff all by himself …… our carry-on bag, cpap, laptop bag, two phones, wallet, belt, two winter coats (we’ll need them in Ohio) and two pairs of shoes!
And then we had 1 ½ hours to kill.
Right on time, our plane was ready. Yeah!
We’d chosen the cheapest fare, which meant we didn’t get to choose our seats.
On our one-hour flight from Lafayette to Houston, Blaine and I sat across the aisle from each other. He by himself, but I had a seatmate. Her name was Jordan and was in her Junior year of college to become an elementary school teacher. We talked the entire way to Houston – partly because she’s afraid of flying and her sister was way up near the front of the plane, while we were relegated to the back. And as we talked the entire hour, we learned many things about each other, including the blessing of sharing seats with a sister in Christ!
We left the plane and she made the effort to introduce us to her sister, and then left, surprising me with a hug. 😊
And then Blaine and I discovered we were stuck in Houston. Our plane left Mexico 3 hours late! Which meant we were 3 hours behind schedule. While we waited in the airport, we enjoyed a very good (and at least somewhat healthy) dinner from Panda Express.
We ended up having to change gates three times from one end of the airport to the other and back again! They finally brought in another plane and another crew to get us on our way, but there’s much more to this story, including having our names and “final boarding call” broadcast over the terminal’s public address system.
So here’s what happened . . . . .
We arrived at our departure gate on Concourse C (which was so far away from where we landed, we had to take a tram), only to discover that they’d moved us to Concourse E (which was far and away from C). Blaine kept checking the progress of our plane and the departure time kept getting later and later, which eventually caused him to call his parents and tell them not to wait up. He also had to call the rental car company and find out what to do if we didn’t arrive in Akron/Canton by the time they closed at midnight. They said if the flight was delayed, they’d stay until 2am.
And so, we continued to wait.
And I got tired of waiting, and went for a walk. On my way back to Blaine, I took a glance at the arrival/departure board and discovered they’d changed our boarding gate to Concourse B and it said we were departing at 7:15pm! I knew it was close to 7pm! I walked faster. I checked the next board to make sure I wasn’t reading it wrong, and received the same information. I walked faster. When I got close to where Blaine was sitting, I checked one more time. I was practically running now!
I told him they moved us again and now we had only 10 minutes to get to our gate! Blaine ran to the desk and was told they’d hold the plane for us. And we practically ran (a long way!), grabbed the tram once again, and all while toting our heavy bags on our shoulders!
But we made it!!! Whew!!!!!
Once again, we were separated. Blaine sat with a newly widowed woman six rows in front of me, while I sat with another elementary school teacher.
Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Melinda! She was headed back to Akron from her home in Las Vegas for her mother’s funeral. She’d just recently lost her father as well. Very sad, but as her family are Christians as well, they have the peace and hope of re-uniting at Home (Heaven)! Such a blessing to share my time with two Sisters in Christ! And a second good-bye hug. 😊
When the drink cart came around, the flight attendant prepared me a custom drink! Wasn’t that nice of her? When I asked if she had any cranberry sprite or something like that, she said no, but she’d make me one out of cranberry juice and Sprite. It was perfect! So unexpected! And it brought to mind an old memory of my Grandpa Collins making me a “mixed drink” on Christmas Eve when I was a child – 7-up, cranberry juice and orange juice.
We arrived in Akron/Canton at a reasonable hour, picked up our checked bag and headed to Blaine’s parent’s home.
And that’s enough for this post.
Tune in to the next ones to see what else we’ve been up to! 😊