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Love?

             You, Lord, are forgiving and good, abounding in love to all who call to you. (Psalm 86:5)

 

                Forgiving: ready and willing to stop feeling angry or resentful toward (someone) for an offense, flaw, or mistake. Please note that doesn’t mean the offense, flaw, or mistake was OK.

Good: To be desired or approved of; having the qualities required for a particular role; possessing or displaying moral virtue.

Abounding: have in large numbers or amounts

Love: To actively seek what is in the best interest of the beloved. (Not necessarily a definition you’ll find in a dictionary, but a definition of agape.)

                As I read today’s passage and remember yesterday’s, the question comes to mind of what we think love is. Yesterday, love involved humbleness, gentleness, patience, and our responses to the person being love for the person, not self-interest (looking in that mirror.) Today, God’s love is wrapped up with forgiveness and goodness. Love involves forgiving, being good, humble, gentle, and bearing with one another.

                Please read through the rest of this post before you respond to what I’m about today. How is God doing on His job of being forgiving, good, and abounding in love? I know the good Sunday School answer is that He gets a gold star for each of them. But take a look around your life? Does God get an A+++ from you right now? Are you feeling forgiven? Are you feeling abundantly loved? Does God seem good to you in everything He does?

                God is perfect. He is love. That doesn’t mean that we feel His love as we should. And we may love someone else (even God) in a way that doesn’t seem loving to them or even to us.  Sometimes, it might be useful to think of what the opposite would look like. If God weren’t forgiving, what would that look like? What would His being evil look like? Or His hatred? In other words, what if our expectations about God’s forgiveness, goodness, or abounding love were the problem? Or our expectations about our own forgiveness, goodness, or abounding love? This is one of those areas in which we need to ask for wisdom – so that we can better love, but also how we can better recognize love.

                Lord, open our eyes to Your love!

               

 

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