first

Opening Prayer: Lord Jesus, help me to allow myself to be loved by you first, so that I will actually be able to genuinely love others.  For if I try to love others first, then things will go terribly wrong.  Amen.

Scripture: 1 John 4:18-19

Journal: Are you making time and space and energy in your life to let God convince you of his great love?  If not, how is this affecting your ability to love?  What does “We love because he first loved us” really mean to you?  How will you practice it?

Reflection: Order is everything in the spiritual life, especially when it comes to our loves.  Our tendency is to love in order to be loved, rather than loving because we have already been loved.  And the impact of getting that backwards is enormous.  For when we turn “We love because he first loved us” into “Love me please, O people, so I will know that I’m worth loving,” true love is no longer a possibility, only a dysfunctional feeding frenzy of needy manipulation.  Thus, if we ever hope to be good at loving others, then we must, first, know what it means to be fully and freely loved by God.

Prayer

Closing Prayer: Lord Jesus, your love is the source of all goodness and life and beauty.  May I never try to love others without first being fully and deeply loved by you.  Amen.