1. Your can have a dog in your lap.
2. You can drink coffee while listening to the lesson.
3. The coffee is free.
4. You can have refills.
5. Sometimes people bake muffins.
6. They are also free.
7. If your baby starts crying, no need to take him outside; someone else will be glad to hold him for you or at least help you cheer him up. Everyone around you is your friend, after all.
8. If that doesn't work, you can always stuff a free muffin in his mouth.
9. Just kidding. Do not stuff a muffin in your baby's mouth.
10. A/C too high? You don't just have to sit there and bear it in your dress and high heels ("why didn't I bring a cardigan?"). The blankets are in the basket over there.
11. Oh, and by the way, you're probably not wearing high heels because you took them off at the door. Or you were smart and didn't bring them. Or you're even smarter and don't own a pair.
12. When you walk in, you are prepared to listen, but also have the comfort in knowing you will be listened to.
13. Flexibility. If someone has an urgent need, everyone stops right then and there to lift it up. If a song is laid on someone's heart, it can be sung. If a word is laid on someone's heart, it can be read or said.
14. Not. Intimidating.
15. Inviting someone to your home feels easy and natural anyway.
16. The bathroom is, like, right there. Which is good because you just had about 3 cups of coffee.
17. I should probably also say something about the whole authentic community thing.
18. People genuinely knowing you, and yet still loving you, is an awesome feeling.
19. You genuinely knowing other people, and finding that you are now willing to forgive, love, and work at relationships where before you would have run away, is an awesome feeling.
20. And even if no one else in the home loves you, at least you still have the dog in your lap.
None of this works, though, unless people are willing to make it work. The home is not some magic place in which people suddenly stop sinning or being selfish. We have to be willing to get into each other's messes and actually enter into each other's lives, to care for each other as family and sacrifice for each other. To give until it hurts, and receive until it hurts our pride.
Because Jesus makes his home in us, we make our home in each other. And that is how the world knows our true home is elsewhere.
13. Flexibility. If someone has an urgent need, everyone stops right then and there to lift it up. If a song is laid on someone's heart, it can be sung. If a word is laid on someone's heart, it can be read or said.
14. Not. Intimidating.
15. Inviting someone to your home feels easy and natural anyway.
16. The bathroom is, like, right there. Which is good because you just had about 3 cups of coffee.
17. I should probably also say something about the whole authentic community thing.
18. People genuinely knowing you, and yet still loving you, is an awesome feeling.
19. You genuinely knowing other people, and finding that you are now willing to forgive, love, and work at relationships where before you would have run away, is an awesome feeling.
20. And even if no one else in the home loves you, at least you still have the dog in your lap.
None of this works, though, unless people are willing to make it work. The home is not some magic place in which people suddenly stop sinning or being selfish. We have to be willing to get into each other's messes and actually enter into each other's lives, to care for each other as family and sacrifice for each other. To give until it hurts, and receive until it hurts our pride.
Because Jesus makes his home in us, we make our home in each other. And that is how the world knows our true home is elsewhere.
#1 this is all totally true
ReplyDelete#2 I miss you & realized this the most while I was reading this & laughing because I can see you saying all of this & it's kind of funny cuz they're all true.
#3 the dog in this picture is adorable
&
#4 I love you chicka!