Hey There!
So there has been a little bit of a transition and I am in Grad School!! So yeah, a lot has been going on and its been a while since I’ve last posted anything.
Amidst the transition, I’ve been doing a biblical word study with Angel Walston who can be found on YouTube at www.youtube.com/user/AngelWalston and it has been really great. The point of the biblical word study was to come up with a list of words of things that you struggle with in your Christian walk and then spend an amount of time studying those words in scripture and finding out how those scriptures apply to your life.
One of the words that I studied was Love. I actually started off with Lust and wanted to know how Lust could be confused with Love and I compared the two. Overall I wanted to know what it meant to love and how to do it the right way. Because if you didn’t know there is a right and wrong way to show someone what it means to love given the many definitions of love floating around today.
One funny thing was that right after the first day of my study on Love, I attended a different church from the one that I usually attend and the sermon for the day was part of a series called UN-Jesus, detailing things that Christians do that are unlike Christ, and the message for the day was UN-Loving. They talked about the five love languages and told the story of the prodigal son from the stand point of the brother who never left home and how he did not show love for his brother as the father had. I was like Whaaaatttt this is going right along with my study!!
Okay let me get to the point. Anyway…in my biblical study one of the scriptures that went with Love was the greatest commandments found in Mark 12:30-31 which says
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.” (NIV)
And in thinking about how to do this, I was just like okay Lord, I love you and I know you love me, but how can I love others as I love myself? A deeper question was: do I even love myself? If I do, how do I show myself love? And lastly how can these same ways in which I love myself be transferred to the people that I come in contact with? I was digging deep.
In the end I came to the conclusion that yes I do love myself. Some days are a little shaky depending on what’s going on in my life but for the most part I am in love with myself and the person God created me to be. I realize that I show myself love in different ways. Here are five ways in which I show myself love and ways in which it can be transferred to others:
1) I love God and I seek a relationship with Him.
This is the best thing you can ever do. God is so Great and His Love is so real. Loving God is good for me and I take joy in resting in Him. Now I say all of this for the Glory of God. There is no way you can truly love yourself if you don’t Love God and understand his love for you. Loving God calls for you to keep his commandments and spread the gospel. (That’s a sermon in itself)
2) I don’t beat myself up but forgive my own mistakes
I am not perfect but I do strive to be as Christ who is perfect. Yes, I mess up sometimes and I pray to God for forgiveness. But sometimes even though we know God has forgiven us, it is hard to forgive ourselves. We think, I just never should’ve messed up in the first place or who would forgive a mistake as big as this? This just lets you know that you are in a place where you haven’t forgiven yourself from what God has already forgotten about. Knowing that people are at different points in their walks and that they struggle in some areas just as I do, allows me to not expect them to be perfect or belittle them when they aren’t. We all need forgiveness, so forgiveness of self and forgiveness of others is really big here. Give yourself and others the benefit of the doubt.
3) I don’t talk down to myself but find ways to encourage
I have moments when I already feel low about some things but telling myself that I am worthless or stupid or such things as that only makes me feel worse. I can imagine how it feels to others. I also don’t like to hear my name dragged through the mud or to feel disrespected (Who would?). So I try not to put my mouth on people or disrespect people in any way. Instead I try to uplift, respect and give words of encouragement. They truly go a long way.
4) I take care of myself.
I feed myself. I bathe myself. I clothe myself. I groom myself. I put myself in my bed. I teach myself things. I buy myself things. I patch myself up when I get a scratch. I do what I can for myself and I only do it by the Grace and Provision of God. My ability to do such can be taken away at any time. So a great way to show love for others is to do what you can for others. If they are in need, find a way to help a brother or sister out. Be that Good Samaritan in somebody’s life.
5) I work to be better and I appreciate myself for me.
You are who you are and God made you that way for a reason. Appreciate your gifts and talents. Appreciate your body shape and intellect. Appreciate all the special things that make you unique. In the same sense, appreciate people and try to see the essence of who they are. Now some people may not be good for you and that is okay. But don’t brush people off because you think they are weird or ashy looking or something superficial like that. You never know they could be angels in disguise.
So yeah, sorry that this is so long. But I love You All. Here is a song by a great artist by the name of Moriah Peters featuring US. Hope you enjoy
God Bless,
Love Presh
Oh How Precious! 