Intention: Agape
My closing is always, Agape & Hugs, Kristianne ? I’ve spent the better part of my adult life doing just that. Agape is Jesus’ compassion manifested in my life. Living in God’s love despite human frailties and sin, especially my own.
The most complicated love story I’ve ever known is when unlovable extends to myself. There was a time when I considered myself unlovable by God and others. Agape (love) is divine love, perfectly pure love. It’s doesn’t preclude me from getting angry or feeling the flush of regret from my past decisions. It’s a soul positioning for me to decide where my heart will settle, on the side of forgiveness. This rests my heart in unconditional love for others and for myself.
For all of my intellectual thoughts and spiritual contemplations, there are days when I get profound joy from finding the right shade of lipstick or remembering the young woman I was, who’d lean her head from the car window, letting wind vibrate her vocal cords. I had lived life with a rush of possibility and optimism. This same me faced chronic pain that wanted me to isolate and feel unlovable or unable to extend God’s love. I became raw, vulnerable and shattered at times. But in God’s word, I found the love song he has written for me and for you.
Jesus had compassion for the hurting before he even saw them. It’s been over 7 years since I answered the call to Compassion That Compels with Compassion Bags, my offering to women fighting cancer. A simple reminder when they felt named by a diagnosis, their life hijacked, that someone they may never meet cares for them. In the fear, with faith suspended in a moment they would know they are brave, BEAUTIFUL, and never alone. At 9650 women, I reach for the 10,000 women God promised me would be blessed with Compassion Bags. I have compassion, hold my arms open in anticipation of hugs and feel them now.
I commit to:
Contemplating and looking at my life approach to how I love others and myself. “We love because he first loved us.” 1 John 4:19 is that agape (love). Today, I will show agape love to myself and to those who might hold a different opinion or belief.