Can I Love?

"It's not easy to love everyone, but it is the call on every prophet's life.  To test us in this, God deliberately puts people around us who are meant to be loved by us.  Oftentimes, we will have to be very creative to love them; some of them, by design, are not easy to love.  But those unlovable ones, ironically, teach us the most about God's heart."

It's safer to withhold love from the unlovable, the hard to love.  When I can't get what I want from a relationship with someone, I draw back.  "You can't give me what I want so you get nothing at all", is my mindset.  What if Christ treated me this way?

It requires less of me when I withdraw from those around me.  The people around me may be the hard to love, the difficult to understand or relate to, and it is easier to pretend that they are less deserving of the love I have to share because they have not earned it.  What if God treated me this way?

I risk nothing when I refuse to share myself with another, a person I deem too irresponsible to handle my love.  She just isn't a good listener.  He does not know how to say sorry.  I can't get what I want so what's the point of this relationship.  What if the Lord related to me this way?

God's Word does not instruct that extending love, exhibiting Christ-like nature is easy.  Scripture does reveal: "And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing."  My gifts, my faith, all null and void if I do not love.  A lover doesn't hide, does she?  She sees those in pain, those yearning for acceptance and uses love to stir up her gifts and help someone to reach the eyes of the Father and receive true love and acceptance from Him.

My love hoarding is wrapped up in un-forgiveness, the idolization of man, and flat-out disobedience (stubborn will and pride).  Daddy, thank you for your forgiveness and your love.  Thank you for never holding out on me.  Thank you for lavishing love on me, always.  Show me how to love as you love.  Teach me to see others as you see them.  Remove these blinders of fear and unforgiveness.  Diminish my pride and bring forth humility.  Touch the hurt places and fill them with desires for you.  I will go where you go, halt when you say halt, and rest in your arms forever.  I love you.