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Thoughts for a Woman's Heart |
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encouragement in things that matter |
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Somebody ... Please Love Me
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The empty ache. The paradoxical feelings of always wanting to run and hide, and yet the longing for the warmth of affection. The strange intermixing of reaching out and complexly turning inward. Slowly the recognition dawned. Somebody ... please love me. When did it start? Why did it start? The child of dependability and acceptance closed her eyes and her heart when promises were broken – when normalcy was corroded. Love was to be found with siblings lovingly drawn together by parents who loved each other – who knew the meaning of "working through and not walking out." But Daddy found his love somewhere else. The child grew, and through the years the strange intermixing tugged at her spirit. To close her heart was easier. To laugh amid the chatter could sometimes silence the cry for someone to look deeply inside and love the child that still lived there. Sometimes she would love impulsively and vulnerably risk, and the closed heart would open to draw in, and to give, in almost reckless abandon. But the open heart met superficial commitments, carelessness, abuse, and damaged trust.
With the highest of expectations and ideals, the child married. A husband could love passionately and intimately. With him, love could be felt in a thousand ways to reveal its intricate depths. There was no knowledge that love must be freely given to be returned. There was no knowledge that expectations and ideals do not create love. They smother it. The child looked to her children. Surely the tenderness of the infant would warm the heart that longed to be loved. But tragedy stole away the life that could give love. Others came, but with them, a growing awareness that real and imagined needs demand much of a mother. Mothering had much more to do with giving than receiving.
Somebody ... please love me. The empty ache was still there. Others spoke of a God who loved. But their words seemed so distant, so unapproachable, so very much for someone else. So much seemed to separate the reality of a loving, personal God from the heart that hid much in its depths. And yet, the God who is love, was already gently opening the closed heart. He drew the child who so desperately wanted love to Himself, and He said, "My child, you have looked in all the wrong places. You have asked family and friends to give what they cannot give. They can only love in part. They too long to be loved. My love is perfect. My love is complete. My love alone can fully satisfy your longing. Let Me love you."
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— Bev |
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