Doin' Love means...

I woke around 1:00 a.m. and noticed the kids had left on the television. When I went to shut it off, I stepped in a puddle of something. Something wet. Something wet in the middle of the living room. The living room with the new carpet. The living room where the kids had been told—a hundred times—not to eat or drink.

I spent the next two and a half hours, ten bath towels and one roll of paper towels blotting up something that, when my wife finds out she’ll tell you, had absolutely nothing to do with her grandchildren—those precious little angels. She’s such a granny.

I thought about waking them. All of them. Making them blot and blot and talk and tell why and what they had done. Who made the mess? Who broke the rules? Someone has to pay for this sin! I looked at them sprawled on the couch and another upside down on the recliner. I carried wet towels to the laundry room and spread them out over the washer and dryer. I wanted to get the shop vac and make some noise, suck it up quick and noisy and with obnoxious behavior. I listened to them breath. Softly snore. I blotted some more, real quiet and silent, in the dark…and wondered why I wouldn’t wake them.

Somewhere between one and four, headlights pierced the night. The neighbor’s kids were headed north. They’d driven hundreds of miles from other states just to stay not much more than a day. Why? I wondered as I stepped on the paper towel and felt the carpet pad give up its liquid. Why’d they spend so much and sleep so little just to say a few simple words of hello and goodbye? To see their dad…one last time.

The whole neighborhood rallied to bring them food. Plate after plate, platter upon platter, neighbors lined up to feed this family and meet their need. Why? Why would they come with arms full of dinners and desserts?

I set up fans and hung up towels and tried to sleep but it wouldn’t come for my wandering mind, wondering why.

Why’d I not wake them?

Why’d the kids come?

Why’d the neighbors rally?

The words softly whispered from FATHER to son…

LOVE woke and slipped in while you slept in the dark.

LOVE cleaned up the spilled and broken mess you’d made of your heart.

LOVE let you rest until you woke in the Light.

LOVE rallied to meet your need.

LOVE drove the distance, pierced the night with Light.

Sometimes…doin’ LOVE means doin’ what’s hard.

Greater love has no man than this: that he lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13)