Learning to Love As Christ Loves
Have you seen the multi-season series about the Life of Jesus called, “The Chosen”? It portrays events in the life of Christ from a whole new, much more relatable perspective. I have learned so much that after finishing season 3 last week, I went back to and started Season 1 again. Each episode helps me learn to love as Christ loves.
I love watching the character who plays Jesus. He shows love in such a genuine way to love as Christ loves in the series. As a result of the watching this character of Jesus, I am learning about what loving kindness, charity and the pure love of Christ looks like.
Lessons On Love Learned At Church
For a long time I was confused by what I learned about “love” at church. Over the years, I’ve heard so much about service and sacrifice, which is part of the pure love of Christ. Unfortunately, I was always worrying if I was loving or sacrificing enough. I even had a mental checklist of service to perform, and I worried that I wasn’t ever doing enough. I just thought I was really bad at love.
Watching the Jesus in “The Chosen” series show love and compassion is teaching me that I can do it too.
Preparing for Church
In preparation for church recently, I took a few minutes to quietly meditate on upcoming parts of the day. I mentally went down my planned activities for the day. These included; Sacrament Meeting and Relief Society. Our daughter and grandsons coming for dinner, planning my week, taking part in a workshop on marriage with Lee.
I thought about the people I would be with. I thought about how I always want to show up as a little bit better version of myself.
Practicing Love At Relief Society
During Relief Society a few weeks ago, the lady who sat behind me was introduced as new to our Ward. I turned around and introduced myself, and invited her to sit next to me. Throughout the meeting I thought about what I could say to her when Relief Society was over. I simply wanted to get to know her a little better.
I was just curious
The question I asked her was, “ tell me the story of how you came to be part of our Ward?” I didn’t want to assume that she was married, had children, etc. We had a delightful conversation about where she lived and what she was doing, and that she has three fur babies and no human babies yet.
I went home feeling great about how easy it was to talk with someone when I was not simply checking the box, “speak to someone new”. I genuinely enjoyed getting to know her and I caught a little glimpse of my better self. Perhaps I was actually “loving as Christ loves”.
How are you doing at becoming the “better self” that you want to be?
What are you learning about love from Jesus Christ?
It is challenging to accept others’ choices and not be disappointed. Or perhaps even “loving” them when the people we love choose different paths than we’ve chosen.
Perhaps I can help?
I coach faithful women affected by family members losing their faith or leaving the LDS church. It’s a really rough time. From my own personal experience, and from the experiences of many others I have worked with, I know how tough this time can be. I would love to help you negotiate this overwhelming time. We learn that loving choices are always available to us. In conclusion, mixed-faith marriages or families are not new or unique, however personally experiencing this situation can be super disorienting.
If you are in this type of turmoil, perhaps now is the time to get some help? We can discuss where you are and we can talk about learning to love as Christ loves.
I invite you to set up an appointment and we can just talk about what’s on your mind and in your heart.
