Learning to Love
(I need to learn from some of the littlest lovers)
Loving people may be one of the most challenging calls to people themselves. Loving small people who cannot speak for themselves, loving old people who, as well, cannot speak for themselves, loving those who aren't like you, loving those who are way too much like you. Loving those near or far or who sit next to your desk everyday or who toddle around and hit you if they don't like the food served in their high chair or those who have said the nastiest, scarring statements to your very soul.
Learning to love is hard. And never mastered. It seems a never ending art where you may need to find a new brush. And if that's not it, find a new color. And if that's not it, try oil. Then watercolor. Then see if you need better lighting. It's adjusting, thinking, walking. It's patience. I thought I knew how to love. But one size does not fit all as you love.
Love is patient. Something I am not. Patient. Which is coupled with kindness and self-giving.
Patient: 1.the bearing of provocation,annoyance, misfortune, or pain, without complaint, loss of temper, irritation, or the like.
2.an ability or willingness to suppress restlessness or annoyance when confronted with delay: to have patience with a slow learner.
Loving is a long haul. And one that might not have an end goal. What would you say the end goal of loving is? So that the other is loved? Why do we love others? Why do people love you? Me? (I always want an end goal, please)
A great and wise teacher was once asked:
“Which command in God’s Law is the most important?”
Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ This is the most important, the first on any list. But there is a second to set alongside it: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ These two commands are pegs; everything in God’s Law and the Prophets hangs from these.
Who are you learning to love with new brushes or paint today?