Learning Boundaries, Loving People

I can't believe it's been a month already. What a month it has been. We have had quite a lot go on the past few weeks. Mike's work really picks up in the spring and summer when the weather is good enough to actually get projects done. My work just went through a major management change which was sudden and unexpected. My dad graduated from college, which was majorly exciting, and is now being pursued by a company, which could mean a move for my parents. My sister Danielle graduates this weekend from high school, and will be working all summer in order to head off to college in the fall. My sister Rachel is currently at a wedding in California, and just got offered a nanny position with a relative, and will be in Idaho all summer. Not to mention having close friends going through some very big things in their lives, some good, some ok, and some... very bad.
I am a person who takes everything on me. If you stub your toe, have a bad day, get a bad haircut, lose your job, lose a loved one, break a relationship- and you tell me, I take it on. I take it on like I am the one going through it- not empathizing, but actually making it my own and grieving with you. This makes me a very loyal friend, and a very exhausted one as well. I have been learning this about myself for a while, and figuring out that it isn't the healthiest habit to have. If I assume the problem like a cloak around me, I become weighed down, very quickly. This is me loving out of myself, not out of the One who is Love. What is the difference? Our love, the love we manufacture and give out of ourselves, is imperfect and incomplete. Our love is a sprinter, great in short bursts, but not made to withstand the test and trial of time. Our love is essentially selfish, and born out of selfish desires and imperfect.
His love, however, is perfect. It molds us, shapes us, comforts us and never lets us down. His perfect love casts out fear and has defeated death. His love is the perfect marathoner, able to withstand, and never withholds. I don't know if you have ever felt this love, dear friend, if you have ever recognized it for what it is. But it has been there with you just the same. Holding your hand, holding you tight, calling to your soul. Listen for it, loved one, because it most certainly is there, and it hasn't given up on you.

"And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from His love. Death can't and life can't. The angels can't, and the demons can't. Our fears for today, our worries about tomorrow, and even the powers of hell can't keep God's love away. Whether we are high about the sky or in the deepest ocean, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 8:38-39

So no wonder I have a hard time loving people. That is not the kind of love I have. But it is the kind of love He has. Which is a wonderful, wonderful thing.