Love Yourself

It’s so hard to love myself as God loves me.  My imperfections, sins and mistakes tend to be what I focus on instead of God’s love within me.  God is love and His love is complete.  I know that it is God’s love manifest within me that moves out from me to bless others.  I also know that the degree to which I love myself is the degree to which I can love God and others.  So, the question is, why don’t I allow God’s love within me to propel me to love myself more fully?  I realize that God does not judge or condemn me, but I do judge and condemn myself.  In His love for me, God forgives all and accepts me exactly as I am, but I do not do the same for myself.  If I could just start genuinely forgiving, accepting, and loving myself as I am, God’s love within me would start to consume and transform me and I would begin loving myself more completely.  And it follows, that if I am wholly loving myself I will have a greater capacity to love God and others.  So from now on I will make a conscious effort to try to love myself as God loves me.

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” (John 15:12 NRSV)