He died for them too.....

You see this?  Yes, it's a tattoo...but, it's more than that.  It's a reminder to me....to love.  Is it hard to love?  Sometimes....

You see, one year ago my uncle's family was rocked by a tragedy.  My aunt and uncle received a call in the wee hours of the morning from a family member....my uncle's brother was involved in a situation with some terrorists in Algeria, where he was working at a plant.  Now, understand....it wasn't MY uncle nor was it my IMMEDIATE family member...but, family is family....what hurts them, hurts me....because I love them.  Victor Lovelady was my uncle's brother.  I wasn't close with him, but I knew him. Terrorism had touched my family.  You never think that it will happen to anyone you know because it always seems like it's "over there" and "far away".  But, somehow, it touched them....it touched me.

Immediately, my emotions went to anger.  I was confused.  I was a little shocked, honestly.  I thought about it and cried about it and my heart just hurt for my poor uncle and Victor's family who would have to figure out a way to find some sort of closure with losing a father, a brother, a husband....why did this have to happen?

I thought on this and thought on this.

Jesus loved me so much that He left His eternal, beautiful, majestic, pure home on High to come rescue me in my stinking, rotting, sin-infested world.  You see, Jesus died for me...even though He knew I would screw up time and time again.  Romans chapter 8 completely explains to me the war between flesh and spirit...."I know better and I do it anyway".  I know Jesus as my personal Savior and I claim to follow Him and His ways.  I believe the Bible is true and I believe that Jesus died, rose, and will return again to get me one day.  I thought a little more.....

"For God so loved THE WORLD, that He gave his only Son..."  Jesus came to this earth and died for EVERYONE.  He died for my children.  He died for my mom and dad.  He died for the homeless person.  He died for the President of the United States.  He died for the drug addicts and the sex addicts.  He died for the students we serve at Hiland Park Baptist Church.  He died for the pygmy tribes in Africa that have never heard of God or Jesus or Heaven.  He died for us ALL....even the terrorists who killed my uncle's brother (this one was a little harder to swallow).  Obviously, I've been taught, and I've read, and I believe the Scriptures that say Jesus died once for ALL (Romans 8:32).  It's hard to put actions to your beliefs when something like what happened to Victor's family touches your life.

So, I got this tattoo....I literally see it every single day.  I look at it and I think of Jesus' love that is all-encompassing.  "He loves them, too..."  passes through my mind every day and reminds me to pray for terrorists and prostitutes and addicts and whoever else that is labeled as an "unsavory" person in my mind.  They are part of God's creation, too.  Although they don't know or love Jesus, He loves them...NOW....even in their sin.

Victor's family remembers and represents his memory by a lightening bolt.  I choose to remember Victor with this heart.....a heart that overflowed with love for me and for others when Jesus hung on a cross and died for me.  Love that saved me in my sin.  Love that Victor had in his heart and showed to the other hostages by being the hands of Jesus reaching out and thinking of others rather than himself.  The surrounding love of Jesus that wraps around us and loves us....even in our "unsavory-ness".