When You look at us Father I believe You look to see more than the form of man and the character of actions and words in the moment… that are antagonistic to You.
You would certainly be justified to be angry but Father I believe that compassion for our condition may be even more strongly present and be what accounts for Your great patience.
Does not this compassion exist because of Your loving kindness and mercy and because there does exist… You have caused to be… another condition we can choose? Did you not create us also with the potential for good and made a way to live in that character?
Do we not…whether we realize it or not… suffer when we follow after our own ways and not yours?
And… might You not… look on from heaven, shake Your head,… in a sense, weep, and maybe comment as You did once in another time…
“If only you knew today what is needed for shalom. For the days are coming upon you when your enemies will set up… and all because you did not recognize your opportunity when God offered it…”
It is no longer hidden from us is it Father? We are in the days. The enemy is all around us… daily. And we know, even today, what it takes to achieve shalom.
There are times Father when we see people fall into suffering, experience pains, misfortune and such and we see them, and sometimes those around them, suffering. And we are moved with compassion… even for those who we may not like. Something about another’s suffering erases, at least for a time in imperfect us, any dislike or animosity we may have held for them and inspires compassion towards them, a desire for the something better that we know exists.
You see our suffering and are moved with compassion… You are patient… You forgive… You desire us to experience instead, Your good, Your peace and joy,
recognizing and taking advantage of the opportunity You have made available and continue to offer.
Father… give us an eye to look beyond the physical presence of others, past words and actions that to our flesh may inspire irritation, impatience, offense, dislike…
look beyond to the person You made them to be… that lies there within their grasp and will maybe be awakened because we respond to them as You respond to us.
Thank You Father for Your perfectly wonderful love, Your compassion…Father…Your patience.
Plant and nurture in us Father we pray… those same attributes in us.
May we covet these and be faithful to exercise them at every opportunity.
Not by our might… but in Yours…
Glory be… Father… to You…
In Yeshua’s name we pray.
Amen.
Luke 19:41-44
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