February 12, 2024
Melissa Valerio
“But if a person isn’t loving and kind, it shows that he doesn’t know God—for God is love.” 1 John 4:8 (TLB)
In theory, this verse makes sense. But in reality, it does not play out in my own personal life as it should. Because I do know God, and yet I’m not always loving and kind. Just ask my children.
I often wonder what it was like for Mary to raise Jesus. This perfect child that was fully God pattering around your feet. When He was a teenager, I bet He obeyed everything His parents asked of Him, without question. He must have been gentle and kind to His siblings. A fun and playful friend. Extremely respectful with the elders that stopped by for visits. It must have been so easy to raise Jesus, the most obedient child in the world. Never needing to discipline or place restrictions on. Never needing to lecture about bad behavior. As a parent, we naturally love our children, but I bet Jesus was SUPER easy to love. No wonder, He IS love. The text goes on to say in verses 9-13 “God showed how much he loved us by sending his only Son into this wicked world to bring to us eternal life through his death. In this act we see what real love is: it is not our love for God but his love for us when he sent his Son to satisfy God’s anger against our sins. Dear friends, since God loved us as much as that, we surely ought to love each other too. For though we have never yet seen God, when we love each other, God lives in us, and his love within us grows ever stronger. And he has put his own Holy Spirit into our hearts as a proof to us that we are living with him and he with us.”
I want my children to know and believe that God is real. To know and believe that God loves them so much that He came to Earth as a man (Jesus) to take the punishment of their sin. That’s an incredible amount of love. But how can they see and feel the love of God if it doesn’t come through a human being? And if God has placed them in my care, whose responsibility is it to show them that love? How can they experience the “agape” love that God has for them if not through me? The kind of love that loves without conditions attached. The kind of love that “loves anyway”. The kind of love that is always patient and kind. The kind of love God has shown me. God IS in me. And I want my children, and the world, to know it.
Prayer: Lord Jesus, forgive me for all the times I’ve been impatient and unkind to Your children. I want them to experience Your love through me. Grow Your love in me and make me a conduit for Your love to pour onto others. In Your Holy name, Amen.
Action: You are a vessel of God’s love. Find someone that needs a dose of love and pour it on without limit.