{"id":775,"date":"2013-03-27T23:14:17","date_gmt":"2013-03-27T23:14:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kandynolesstevens.com\/?p=775"},"modified":"2013-03-27T23:14:17","modified_gmt":"2013-03-27T23:14:17","slug":"jesus-and-his-peeps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/?p=775","title":{"rendered":"Jesus and his peeps"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"I<\/a>

Jesus & Judas – I found this picture on hypervocal.com. I would love to credit the original creator. It is not listed on their site and it is stunning work.<\/p><\/div>\n

When Clo was just over a year old, Reed taught her to say \u201cWhat up my peeps?\u201d.\u00a0 Seeing that curly-headed bundle of sweetness toddle around saying such a thing made anyone within earshot burst into laughter.\u00a0 It was one of the first things my future brother-in-law heard my kids say. Big brothers, argh!<\/p>\n

A quick look at my Facebook account reveals that I am just shy of my own 400 peeps. (I\u2019m not actually counting, and I had to go look it up.) \u00a0I have been blessed with such amazing friends that my cup runneth over.\u00a0 Some of the KF\u2019s (Kandy\u2019s Friends) I have only met once and others I have never met in person but business dealings have connected us across the miles.\u00a0 I epitomize the saying that it isn\u2019t what you have but who you have in your life. A closer look would find that there is an inner sanctum \u2013 the tight circle of besties that are there for me before I even need to send out the bat signal. Yet missing in that number are a few who have brought me heartache through the years, and though I have forgiven them I just haven\u2019t been able to stick my heart back into their drama.\u00a0 For some of those relationships it took me years to realize that we weren\u2019t good for each other. I read a book once that in a nutshell brought relief to this girl\u2019s heart and soul.\u00a0 The author relayed that God calls us to forgive those that hurt us, but He doesn\u2019t call us to live with basement dwellers \u2013 those that perpetually bring us down.\u00a0 That simple statement was freeing to me.<\/p>\n

A while back I went with a friend whom I admire to our church\u2019s regional women\u2019s leadership conference.\u00a0 One of the speakers was a really young priest (I forget which denomination), but she was a dynamic speaker.\u00a0\u00a0She spoke on the thousands that came to see Jesus, but that mostly he was surrounded by a group of close friends. Later,\u00a0she\u00a0talked about those hurts committed against us by those closest to us.\u00a0 This is something that I really understand.\u00a0 What came out of her mouth next totally shocked me.\u00a0 \u201cJesus gets it.\u00a0 He gets when someone you love lets you down and hurts you deeply.\u00a0 Remember \u2013 here she paused and lowered her voice<\/em> \u2013 he only ended with 11 friends because one of them (Judas) defaulted.\u201d<\/p>\n

What did she just say?\u00a0 Her words\u00a0rained down\u00a0like a soothing balm to my soul.\u00a0 The point of her talk was a reminder to take our hurts before the Lord of Lords because he understood hurt and betrayal.\u00a0 I love Jesus, and I love \u201ctalking\u201d to Him, but never once in forty years had I thought about that He too was let down by his friend.\u00a0 And not just once either \u2013 Thomas doubted, Peter denied and those\u00a0are only the\u00a0examples of the ones we know about.<\/p>\n

Jesus laughed and cried with his friends (not just the disciples).\u00a0 The sweetest verse to me is John 11:35 Jesus wept<\/em> (NIV) when he learned of his friend Lazarus death.\u00a0That verse reminds me that he did hurt emotionally.\u00a0His heart leapt when He celebrated with His friends. \u00a0He rejoiced. He attended weddings and parties, and He stayed up late just talking with His friends.\u00a0 He also retreated, prayed, rested, and loved.<\/p>\n

Hey \u2013 wait a minute!\u00a0 We\u00a0do all those same things, but seldom do we stop and think that Jesus \u2013\u00a0in His\u00a0humanness \u2013 did a lot of stuff with his friends just like us.\u00a0 Why did I never stop to think that he too was hurt by them as well? As Easter is approaching, we remember that Jesus was fully God and that he took on the sins of the world, but we forget that he was also fully human, feeling the same things you and I experience.<\/p>\n

He was wounded by humanity, but his heart was wounded by one close to him first.\u00a0 Simply the sweet little priest was right; Jesus gets it. When we are hurt or wounded, we really can turn to him.\u00a0 He’s there with open arms and listening ears. Although, I don\u2019t think he would really say it, it might be easier to reach out if we envision him saying, \u201cWhat up my peep?\u201d\u00a0 You never can tell . . .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Clo was just over a year old, Reed taught her to say \u201cWhat up my peeps?\u201d.\u00a0 Seeing that curly-headed bundle of sweetness toddle around saying such a thing made anyone within earshot burst into laughter.\u00a0 It was one of the first things my future brother-in-law heard my kids say. Big brothers, argh! A quick […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[59,73,137,172,195,233,312,321,325,330,350,380,470,475,623],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/775\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.realsweetgrace.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}