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Previous Challenge Entry (EDITOR'S CHOICE)
Topic: DEVOTED( 02/04/21)

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TITLE: The Love That Matters Most | Writing Challenge By Linda Lawrence 02/10/21

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My friend’s shoulders and countenance, weighed down with depression, spoke volumes as she silently rolled her suitcase across the threshold of my home. She came for a week-long retreat—a time with God, a time with me—hoping for personal renewal. My guest room offered her a sanctuary alone with God. I offered her friendship. I shared many of my God stories with her—stories of my growing love for Jesus, hoping to stir in her the waning embers of what had once been a strong fiery faith. Her stories were of sadness, depression, and fear of God’s rejection for having lost her first love of Jesus. I hoped my stories would encourage her, but saw they only heightened her sadness.

My shepherd pastor came for a visit. He already knew my stories, but we listened together as my friend told him hers—stories of deep devotion in her youth, and the series of betrayals that robbed her of trust and intimacy with the Lord that had once been her identity.

“I want to love Jesus like her,” she cried, pointing at me.

I get it. I love Jesus so much more today than I did in my youth. But I spent decades struggling with guilt at my own sense of not loving well. My gospel story shows how God convinced me that in His eyes I was blameless and complete. Oh, not in my eyes—never in my eyes! But His perspective is from outside time and space. In the framework of Jesus’ righteousness, this truth is given to me as a gift. My stories of how the Lord wooed and won my heart did stir up desire in this sister and friend, but they also stirred up grief and her sense of being a lost lamb who had gone astray—the very opposite of my intention.

My shepherd pastor wisely turned her focus to Jesus, toward another perspective—a powerful truth that lifted her from the pit in which she was mired. “It’s not how much you love Jesus that matters. It’s realizing how much Jesus loves you!”

Immediately, the change of perspective lifted both her countenance and her spirit—even her shoulders. I could see it and feel it. Truth dispelled the cold dark shadows—we love Jesus because He first loved us.

The last day of the retreat my friend and I warmed ourselves by the crackling fire in the hearth, remembering, processing, and celebrating the rekindling of first love in her heart.

I John 4:19

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