Real-ationships VS Sand Lickers

     We all get thirsty. We are human. Thirst drives you to a water fountain, a soda machine, or to your kitchen sink. You'll find yourself stopping whatever you are doing just so you can get something to wet your pallet. Now picture yourself right here;

   Yep. You're in a desert. Stranded. Now imagine yourself thirsty and in desperate need of just something to drink. There's no supply of any liquid anywhere except you notice a cool fresh glass on lemonade sitting upon a rock only about a foot taller than you are (Lemonade in a desert? Girl, you're cray!) You take one look at it, but walk about saying "Oh. Its too high up." So you go searching and end up licking the sand hoping that it will quench your thirst (Call me cray).

Isaiah 41:17
“When the poor and needy search for water and there is none, and their tongues are parched from thirst, then I, the LORD, will answer them. I, the God of Israel, will never abandon them."

    So why do we lick up sand when there's a refreshing glass of lemonade just in reach?  Well, after reading the verse above, we can come to this conclusion why so many people are licking up sand. Can you think of someone going in and out of love? A new boyfriend or girlfriend every week? Or maybe even every month? Everyone looks for that special someone, but some people feel that is their top priority. These people go in and out of "like" with someone over and over, and they are constantly heart broken. We all have that urge for a love in our hearts.

    The kind of person I described above is a sand licker. Another kind of sand licker is one focused on money, possessions, looks, and titles. Sand lickers search for love in all the wrong places. Obviously, sand can never quench our thirst, and neither will these things satisfy our need for a love. Now don't get me wrong, its okay to think about how much money you have or how your boyfriend or girlfriend is doing, but sand lickers search for a love from these things that only comes from God. Unlike a relationship with boyfriends and girlfriends, God gives us a realationship. His love never fails, it always endures through every circumstance, it never leaves us, it never forsakes us, it never changes its mind, and most importantly, God's love is real. Sand lickers choke on what they have, but when they stop licking up sand, its their choice if they reach for the glass of lemonade; the real thirst quencher who gives us with the realest realationship; God.

John 4:14
"But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty again. It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life.”

Matthew 5:6

God blesses those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be satisfied.

Makeshift Love

    I don't know about you, but I hate being cold. Being cold is one thing I don't handle well. I get angry easier and I'm unhappy. Overall, I'm just unpleasant to be around when I'm cold. Well, the heater in my house broke two days ago. My house dropped to about 59 degrees. That made me about the crankiest person alive because I hate being cold! Out of desperateness, we put a space heater at the end of the hallway and another in the living room. It raised the temperature of the house to 61 degrees, but that's still pretty cold. Later on that night, I was laying on the couch doing a word search (for some odd reason) and then the power went out! I thought I was on a show called, "Could She Handle Being Amish?" But! The next day, the power was back, the repair man came, and all was good in the world. Well, all was good in my home.

So whats my point? 

"And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, and all your strength." - Deuteronomy 6:5 NLT

    God is love. Love is God. If you feel love, God is surely inside of you. If God is inside of you, then you surely feel love. They are a package deal because God Is Love. He is also a bunch of other wonderful things to, but they all come from is unfailing love. His love never ever changes. His love for you and me and your mom and your brother and your karate teacher and your babysitter and your teacher and your friends and your coach and your neighbor and your stranger and your classmates and every person on this planet will always be the same. God will always love you no matter what you have done.
     Sometimes, situations we face, good or bad, let our love for God fade or diminish. Say you're failing a class, got in trouble for something you didn't do. Sometimes we practically blame God. Okay, less in those situations, I understand that. I am familiar to the scenario when someone blames God for an abusive childhood, being constantly bullied, or a loss of a close family member.

"Why, God?" You say, "Why did you let this happen to me?"

     Surely, if God loves me, this would have never happened to me. God must hate me for doing this. If I didn't lie, or cuss, or bully, or murder, God would love me and I would be truly happy. 

   So what happens next? We place our love in someone or something else. We look for something to satisfy our love. Maybe your dad mistreats you, so you look for attention from another guy to fill the void. You look for love. Maybe people bully you at school, so you turn to a knife on your wrist to make that pain you get inside from their insults and comments seem less to you. Whatever the scenario is, it all comes down to this;

You're looking for love.

    Sweet, sweet love. So you go and do what you do and your satisfied, but it doesn't fill you. You still feel that emptiness in your heart. So you go further with this guy or you cut other places with that knife, and before you know it, you're in trouble.


You were looking for a little bit of love

and now you're pregnant.

You were looking for a little bit of love

 and now your family is standing before your grave

wondering what they did that was wrong.

     You see, love isn't something we can recreate. Love is God. God is love. True love comes from God alone. No one else. No earthly habit, no earthly desire, nothing can ever replace God's love for us. So why do we try to create makeshift love when we know that only true love comes from God? 

     We lose or never seek out our love for God, just like when my heater broke. When my heater broke, we tried used space heaters, but it was never enough. This is just like when we don't count on God anymore to provide for us and love us, we turn to other habits and desires looking for that same feeling we get from God. Just like how attention from guys or cutting satisfies you for a little, so did the space heater. But just like the space heater only raised the temperature in my house a few degrees, these desires we turn to don't satisfy us completely like that half empty feeling we get. Just like the power going out on top of it all, we go overboard and things get worse, and in some cases, it becomes to late. 

     In some scenarios, its too late! When the heater guy came and fixed me heater, everything was okay and I'm nice and warm and cozy again. But we are talking about the hope of salvation! Each and every one of us has been repaired, like a heater, by a team. That team consists of a friend or family member, and the coach is God. Remember God? He's the one with the never ending, never changing, never failing Love! That team who brought us to God was lead by their love for God and their desire for you to have His love filling, even overflowing, your heart. That repair man made me and my house warm and wonderful again. Just like God is the only one who can repair your broken heart and set you on fire for Him again! And your teammates help you each step of the way so you don't have to endure through every trial alone. 

God;

loves

blesses

calls

strengthens

forgives

purifies

each and every one of us

 Makeshift loves are found everywhere. 

There are so many people looking for love in all the wrong places.

Never replace your love with something that will never love you like God does.

Makeshift loves are never stable. They always end in disaster.

But I can promise you that our great and glorious God will never change his love for you.

No matter what you do, God will always love you

and your brother

and your mom

and your teacher

and your neighbor

and your stranger

and your friends

and your coach

and your classmates

and your karate teacher

and your babysitter

and every person on this planet

with a love so much greater than any makeshift love.

"And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God's love. Neither death nor life, neither angels for demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow- not even the powers of hell can separate us from God's love." -Romans 8:38