Loving the Unlovable: Drawing on God's Love When Ours Falls Short

"'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" — Matthew 22:37–39 (NIV)

It's easy to love those that you are naturally attracted to — there are some people you just click with. Perhaps because of their personality or their interests — just the whole sense of who they are. You feel like they could be your best friend.

The challenge that Jesus puts before us as human beings though, is not to just love those who love us, but to love those who we, in the natural, would not be attracted to: to love the unlovely. In fact, it was once said that you can't be any closer to God than you are to the person you love least.

Jesus commanded us to love our neighbour as we love ourselves and of course our neighbour could be anybody that comes into proximity with us. What Jesus was really saying was to love all those who are around about you!

Now it's pretty hard to do that in your own strength. In fact human love seems to fall short of the capacity to love the unlovely and that is where we need the love of God within our lives. Because His love is an unselfish love: a love that is beyond the natural: it's a love that finds its origin in the very nature of God Himself — for God declared He is Love.

So perhaps you're finding it hard to get on with people you're working with. Or maybe there's a neighbour who irritates you something terribly. Or maybe there's someone in your immediate family or a partner who just continually rubs you up the wrong way. When your love may be insufficient, why don't you draw on the love of God?

Ask for His help and watch how He, together with you, can make even those who are unlovely, lovable.

Reflection/Action:
Make a prayer list of the people you're struggling with. Determine each day to ask God to help change your heart toward them. Remember, change begins with you! You can't force change on others. Only they can change themselves! However, God can work in ways you can't to bring change. That's why praying to God for people is so important. It's good to also keep a list of answered prayers!