Messy Advice... | Spiritual Deodorant Required

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This one's for anyone who's ever replayed a conversation in their head

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12 times trying to figure out if that awkward hug was

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love or just weird. Let's be honest, caring

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isn't always clear. Sometimes it's second guessing what

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you said, wondering if you should have stayed longer or backed off

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sooner. Loving people well sounds good on paper, but in real

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life, it's more like stumbling forward in the dark, hoping grace covers the

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gaps. Gaps. And half the time, you're not sure if you're planting seeds of

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love or just stepping on rakes. You try to be present.

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You try to listen. You offer help, and it's met with silence

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or awkwardness or maybe even offense. You think,

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was that too much, not enough, did I make it worse,

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or just mildly confusing with good intentions? This is

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messy advice for people who care, for anyone who's still trying to love

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well without a clear map, and who's willing to keep showing up

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anyway. This is Johan on the edge of helpful,

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fumbling forward with love, second guessing, and enough sweat to

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ruin your spiritual deodorant. Today's question

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may as well have been the theme of this whole series. Let's get right

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into it. I'm trying to love people well,

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but I often feel unsure if I'm doing it right. How do I know if

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I'm actually helping or just trying hard and hoping?

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Which to be fair also describes most of our cooking, parenting,

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and prayer lives. If you've ever felt more like a well meaning

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mess than a spiritual rock star, you're not alone.

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According to a 2022 Faith in Canada survey,

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sixty eight percent of practicing Christians say they wanna live out their faith

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in practical ways, but more than half feel unsure

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how to do that in a world where care can be complicated.

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We're trying to bring casseroles to heart problems, and sometimes it

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works, Sometimes, not so much.

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We wanna love people well, but the how is often

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fuzzier than we'd like to admit. So what do we do with all the

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doubt, the awkwardness, the trying and not always getting it

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right? Sometimes loving people well feels less like a

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spiritual gift and more like a series of small social

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experiments. Some of them go great. Some of

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them end up in follow-up texts, social anxiety,

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and a weird feeling you can't quite shake.

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Picture this. You drop off a meal for someone going through

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a tough time. You rehearse what to say on the drive there.

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You hand it over with a warm smile and, let me know if you

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need anything, and then spend the rest of the night overthinking

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every part of that interaction. Was it too much, not

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enough? Did it land as love or land as awkward? You weren't

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trying to impress anyone. You were just hoping they'd feel the love that didn't

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quite fit in the Tupperware. Let's take a look at some scripture.

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Let's get biblical biblical.

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There in Luke seven, here's a woman that joined a

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party that she wasn't invited to, described as a woman

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of the city who is a sinner, not someone any respected leader

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would dare be associated with. Everyone else is reclining at the

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table, calm, composed, respectable, but not her.

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Now the way I picture it, she's ugly crying, not a

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dignified tear sliding down her cheek, but that full

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body kind of sobbing that takes over your face. Her

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hair's down, which is already a cultural risk, and she's using

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it along with her tears to wipe Jesus's feet.

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This is messy, tangibly, emotionally,

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socially. It's not inspiring in that sanitized way we usually like

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our faith stories. It's raw. It's disruptive,

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visually uncomfortable. And Jesus, he doesn't

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rush her. He doesn't clean her up. He doesn't stop

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her or make it more palatable. He lets her come undone

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at his feet, and he tells everyone else in the room,

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she understands what this moment is really about.

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He honors the emotion, the risk, that

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cost. It wasn't tidy, but it was true.

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She didn't check if her love made sense. She just poured

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it all out, and Jesus didn't flinch. In

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fact, he called it beautiful. You see, you don't need to

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get it all right to be walking in love. If you're still

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asking questions, still paying attention, still trying to care without

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turning into a machine, you're doing better than you think.

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Love is clumsy most of the time, but it's still holy.

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You don't need to be amazing at this. You just need to stay open to

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the mess. So if you made it through the series still

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wrestling, still laughing, still loving, you're exactly who this was

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for. You're not behind. You're becoming.

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If you got a story to share, if you wanna be part of a group

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of like minded individuals trying to care in the messy,

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join our Care Impact podcast group on Facebook or head over to

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our website and keep tabs on what we're up to at

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careimpact.ca. Until next time, keep loving,

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keep laughing, and if you made a mess out of loving people well,

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congrats, that means you're actually loving people

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and always remember to stay

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curious.