by
Amy Key
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It wasn’t until recently that I paid attention to a line in Blue ’s first song that goes, ‘I love you when I forget about me.’ In the last few years, I’ve come to realise that in the romantic loving I’ve done, I’ve often obliterated my sense of self: I’ve not located my needs, let alone asked for them to be met. I’ve just doggedly pursued a kind of abstract reciprocation – have I been noticed or have I not? – and because I’ve not paid enough attention to what I want, the vast contrast between what I want and what I’ve received hasn’t been as visible to me. Romantic love transformed me but not in the way I’d dreamed it would. It made me forget myself, not to my self’s flourishing advantage – connected, inspired, courageous – but to my detriment. My resilience, self-image and facility for care scrawny with neglect.
Knowing what love is certainly helps us learn to walk in love, but we are also wise to understand what love is not. Many people become confused about love because people tell them they love them and then act in ways totally inconsistent with real love. Love is not talk or theory, and it is not merely a sermon. It may produce feelings, but it is much more than a feeling, because we can love by choice even when the feeling of love is absent.
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We don’t have to feel like doing the right thing in order to do it. This is what it means to love people who are hard to love. It means to treat them as Jesus would treat them, no matter how they have treated us.
Loving people means doing what is for their good, not necessarily yours. Love is the greatest thing in the world. It has the power to change lives, and it defeats the devil in his works on the earth. Nothing gives people more joy than feeling loved. We can tell someone we love them, and it is meaningful, but when they feel loved, it is much, much better. People will always remember how you made them feel when they were with you, even if they forget what you said or did. Make people feel good about themselves and you will have many friends.
I think few men would have done what Dave did, because most people are too addicted to their own comfort to be willing to suffer in order to give God time to heal another person. But Dave is a godly man, and an unusually patient one, and he learned early in our relationship to enjoy the parts of me that were enjoyable and turn the ones that weren’t over to God. He knew he couldn’t change me, so he prayed for me and went about enjoying his life.
When you find yourself faced with someone who is hard to love, thinking about how God loved you when you were hard to love will help. The first step toward loving people who are hard to love is to pray for ourselves to have a godly attitude and to remember that God loved us when we were hard to love.
Having a desire to please God doesn’t mean we will enjoy loving people who are hard to love. Remember, love is much more than a feeling. It is how we treat people. God isn’t asking us to let people abuse us, but He is asking us not to give up on them simply because they are difficult to deal with. There are times when we cannot be with certain people because they are abusive, but we can still pray for them and love them in ways that won’t put us in harm’s way. These are rare cases, and most of what we are talking about in this book pertains to ordinary people who for a variety of reasons are just hard to love.
We are never truly free until we feel no need to impress anyone. If and when we reach that point, then we can rest internally and live without concern about what people think of us. We know that what they think is between them and God, and that what they think cannot hurt us. It is what we think of ourselves that really matters.
Like many people, I was insecure for years, but as I received God’s unconditional love and acceptance, I found security in Christ. The better we feel about ourselves, the less we feel the need to argue over opinions and fight to be right, and we can find a way to disagree agreeably if the other person is willing to do so. Some people won’t be at peace no matter what we do, but we can all be peaceful in and through Jesus.
I want to say again: The best way not to remember the evil that has been done to you is to forget it as quickly as possible. Don’t keep a mental list and keep reminding yourself of the things that have been done to you, or you will never get over them. God forgives and forgets our sins, which is what we should do in our dealings with one another. Another helpful strategy is to believe the best, instead of the worst, about people in every situation.
It is difficult to keep showing love to someone who never seems to appreciate it, but we are not responsible for how others act; we are only responsible for our own actions. Make the decision to do what is right no matter what anyone else does, and you will be a happy person. Don’t fail to walk in love, because love never fails.
If you don’t like yourself, then you are miserable, because you never get away from yourself. Everywhere you go, you are there. To love yourself simply means that you have accepted God’s love for you. I am not suggesting that we be in love with ourselves, be selfish, and think only of ourselves, but we do need to have a healthy attitude toward ourselves and appreciate what God did when He created us.