Lenten Reflection Day 9

For this Lent, one of the things I have decided to do is to learn a new language, a love language. Not the usual romance languages of Italy or Spain, but one whose origin goes even further back in human history. I’m talking about the love Jesus spoke of in Matthew 22:37-41. “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Jesus is speaking here of agape love. Putting love of God and neighbor above ourselves. How do you go about implementing love like this in our daily living? What would ‘speaking’ this language look like? I believe it begins with making a resolution to place another’s needs before our own. Family, friends, coworkers, neighbors, those individuals who may be most reluctant to ask for our assistance. While the majority of us will not be called to literally lay down our lives for anyone, as Jesus did, our sacrificial offering of our time, talent, and treasure will be enough.
The next step in learning the lingo would consist of putting away our preconceptions of who we can help and be open to helping those that it may make us uncomfortable to be around, but need our love nonetheless. Those on the outskirts of life, those who we have failed to reconcile with, those who have hurt us. Agape love does not discriminate, and neither must we.
Lastly, we must be open to going wherever God wishes to lead us so that we may meet people where they are. The random phone call at 2 am from a struggling friend, the money you saved for a family vacation being donated to a neighbors Gofundme cancer treatment page, visiting with a sick or shut-in family member on your only off day, playing a game with your children, nieces, or nephews, although you’ll have to stay up late to catch up on work. These simple, real world examples that seem so common place are in fact opportunities that give us a chance to ‘speak the vernacular.’ How could our God who is love give us anything other than the purest of all languages, that of faith in action, Agape!
CHALLENGE: Join me in learning this ‘new’ language this Lenten season. Let us encourage one another in sacrificial, life-giving moments of love. Where we choose to love God by way of caring for His people. “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.” MT 25:31-46.
Blessings to You and Yours!