Love your neighbor as...

Yourself. Yes, we have all heard of this scripture. Jesus, when asked which of the commandments was the most important, responded with making sure that you love God with everything but that the second most important was to love your neighbor as yourself. Lately, the Lord has really been speaking to me on this concept. A few weeks ago He told me that so many of us focus on the first half of that scripture – the branches. But, we forget the most important part – as yourself (the root).

That is why no matter how hard some of us try to be nice and love others, we feel like we fall short so many times. I know I would feel like a terrible person because I would wake up and tell myself to brighten someone’s day and then the wrong thing can be said to me and completely throw off my day. I felt like something was wrong with me. Then, as I mentioned, God spoke to me about focusing on the root instead of the branches. And I had to do an honest self-evaluation of how I felt about myself. I wrote down all of the lies that the enemy convinced me about myself and when I went back over those lies I realized how much bondage I was living in and it made sense that loving others was a struggle for me.

I couldn’t even love myself.

You see, the way you love others is a reflection of how you love yourself. If you have high expectations for yourself then you will have high expectations for others, if you’re hard on yourself then you’re hard on others, if you don’t forgive yourself then you don’t forgive others and so on and so forth. And how you love yourself is a reflection of how much you BELIEVE God loves you. I always KNEW God loved me and He sent His only son to die on the cross for my sins and all those other scriptures we quote. But, I’ll be honest in saying I didn’t quite believe it.

To know is to possess the knowledge of something, whether false or not. To believe is to accept something as true and have confidence in it. So, after I realized that I did not believe God loved me, I asked him to show me. Of course, God answers His children. A few days later, I was having a normal conversation with my dad and he said something to me that I never really knew about myself. I had to get off the phone with my dad because in those few words God was pouring out his love to me and saying “Chikela the enemy did not want you here, he did not want you to live. He tried his best to kill you but I came in. I love you so much that I ordered your days, I know what you are going to do every single day of your life. I knew you would go through all those things in your life, I knew you would make those horrible decisions, but I didn’t care, I still chose you.” I was crying so hard that I could barely breathe. I literally felt this weight that I was holding onto all these years fall off.

I don’t know who you are. I don’t know why you chose to read this blog. But I want you to know that God loves you. And I’m not just saying that, I mean it! He knows every single detail about you. He knows about the struggle you are in. He knows you are hurting. He knows about the deep dark secrets you hope no one will find out. He knows everything. And HE STILL CHOSE YOU! Soak that up. No matter what you may have done or will do in life, God still chose you. So, I challenge you to write down those lies you’ve believed about yourself and ask God to show you His truth. Then you can begin to love others…..even more than you love yourself.