REGRET

Something that is only a feeling

Something that leads to healing

A pain that tugs me back to where I've been

a call to ponder where I was and when

The way to remind  I'm not as whole as I thought

a hook, a barb that burns each time I'm caught

The cause for unexplainable behavior

the most likely reason I will waiver

The effect of daring to pursue a dream

believing things are exactly as they seem

And I wrestle with regret……

If there's an explanation it has to be trusting in something less than my Master. I cannot believe that love is ever wasted. I cannot believe that trusting humanity is something I should never do.  I can believe that assuming that anyone can handle my heart but my Savior is a failure that leads to regret. Yet, I find myself believing this very thing…so foolishly, even wistfully , and I always end up in the same place; aching, burning, tossing in the night and hurting in the day and I remind myself why, or maybe He does.

In so many ways, on so many days, for so many reasons I have expected those less than deity to understand my heart.  It is not that it is so "deep" or so "complex"…it is only that it is so ever-changing, so undecided and as my Father would say: "deceptively wicked".   Indeed, I do not understand it myself but I so badly want some living breathing fleshly soul to "get it" for me.   There are those who would pretend, and so many that would try but I always come back to this place…this very painful feeling.

Why am I not satisfied with the One who understands? The only explanation can be found in me.  If I were putting Him where I should be putting Him….if His will was at the center of my life? I would not be looking for another to understand.  I would be content in the hands of my Maker.  This longing to have my heart held by another would not exist in me.  Other longings?? Indeed! I was made for relationship, but this is something entirely different.  Love and the capacity to Love in any relationship is not to lead to regret.  There is nothing wrong with "practicing" Love over and over…even when it is not received…even when it is rejected…even when it is eventually "thrown away."  None of this endeavor ever leads to regret. 

I know these things.  I know that regret is a result of misguided expectation…faith in the wrong things, the wrong being.   Love can lead us this direction but only when we rely on our own strength to love. This only happens when we fail to love as He does.  This is a failure of mine. It is one I repeatedly try to "correct". My expectations lead me to regret because I can only give to a certain point before I expect and that is NOT how my Master has loved me. I can only be a certain percentage of who I am before I expect a certain standard from another.  You know how humans do that? Do you?

Have you ever thought that IF you could be good enough, maybe your Father would give you that "thing" or "Dream" you want so strongly? Perhaps, if you did enough for Him, if you gave up that habit or "thing" you know He doesn't like, well then maybe He'd relent?  Or, have you ever promised God that YOU will do His bidding if He does "this" for you?  Have you ever made Him a promise with an expectation attached?? This is your own foolish love.  It is NOT His! If you have done this…then you understand my issue with my "love" versus His Love.  When I love another in my own strength I expect to give and then I somehow, somewhere deep in me expect to get.  I don't even realize it at first and maybe what I want is minuscule…maybe not so demanding.  I'll never express my expectation, even.  I just expect the other to be so moved by my obvious  "giving" that they instinctively know, what I need, what I request of them.  It seems small to me…just the littlest response and I would not say I'm "greedy" about it but I feel what it leads to, where I end up at, every time.  In this moment, I feel it.  

My love is often a response.  It is not an action.  It is a reaction.  I feel loved.  I feel "cared for" and then I respond.  My Master did not wait for that feeling to love me.  My heart deceives me..over and over it does that. I do not always love this way.  I have Loved like Him.  Really, I have…maybe even more than many. I revert back though.  I go back to my way, my instinctive nature so very often. My flesh is not dead.  It is very much alive. It's the struggle between my flesh and my spirit.  Crucifixion never happened and that frightens me and makes me realize what is to come.  Here I am with regret.  It's a familiar feeling that I despise.  It reminds me of the work I have to do.  It reminds me of where I've been.  It tells me the direction that I have to go…the path I've found every reason NOT to take.

I've learned something this time though. I understand now, where to go from here.  I've never had a good reason to engage in strong, consistent, committed, relationship. Regret;  you finally teach me. I MUST learn how to Love.  This is my reason. I finally have a reason to start the journey.  I just hope that I can stay on the right path to get there. 

JM 2015

"What man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? 11 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him! 12 Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets."  Matthew 7:9