brisk morning rambles

riding my scooter lately has brought me much joy. it's a mix between the cold fingers, ability to smell the overwhelmingly delicious freshly baked smell in certain places in downtown columbus, pulling up next to a car at a stoplight and watching them sing and dance and actually being able to hear the music that is causing them to do so.

i've been postponing a trip to the grocery store (number one, because i was supposed to be in new york this weekend, and number two, because i thought, "well how am i supposed to carry a gallon of milk on this thing")

i suppose part of my worldview/ person mind-set in interactions with other people, is the whole 'do unto others' philosophy. i've never thought about it much until today, but it makes sense. it's a driving force in actions and trajectory during the day.

so, last night when i used the remaining 3/4 of the new gallon of milk one of my roommates had just purchased i promised to replace it as soon as possible. so this morning, it's on my mind first thing. there needs to be milk by ten am incase somebody wants cereal. so i get to cross another first off my list, riding a motorscooter with a gallon of milk. make it two actually. milk and orange juice. it felt good to commute through the brisk autumny air and do something that i owed to my house. i was doing unto others...

...on the other hand, 'as you would have them do to you' the remainder of that 'do unto others' verse, is seemingly more of a let-down than not. i think one of my biggest off-the-track-and-thinking-wrongly mindsets is that everyone's under the same social mindset of 'doing unto others' and certain times, i can't comprehend why they wouldn't be doing exactly what they'd want done to them. but i'm wrong, and i have no right to expect that from anybody.

i am the problem; when i'm doing unto others, so that they might do back to be. more of a karma than love.

last sunday, a married couple openly shared some very hard things about their marriag--his tangible faults (visible in the way that many would recognize as wrong) and then her pride and judging (the more subtle, inner, hidden-deeply problems than can be kept much more of a secret) she always had it in her mind that almost anything that she could do wrong, it was still less bad than him, just because of the way his problem was a big in-your-face. she struggled to ever feel responsibility for her own problems, because they were more easily hidden.

the redemptive part of this story, is that they were both in the wrong, and even though it's hard to respond in grace to someone who has wronged you, if you respond in that way not because the person deserves it, but because you love jesus and you're willing to be humbled to love, even when it's not a fair trade. it changes things.

so, as much as that story didn't apply to me (unmarried as i am) it does apply very much to me. i want so badly to not let peoples actions and reactions effect me as they do. to want to continue loving (with my heart and with my hands, thoughts and actions) as i do and never to look around and realize that they aren't loving the people around them like that and feel discouraged. i want to, for the love of jesus, to be able to persevere and love them well. simply to 'do unto others as you would have them to do you'

and not 'do unto others because then they will do unto you(and others)'

grace, grace, grace. come, come into my life.