A Lighter Way Week 24: When God's Love Becomes Personal
Oct 31, 2026“Teach us to love as you love.”
When I started working with a spiritual director seven years ago, she said, “Well, I believe God is love, and if I believe God is love, then…” and proceeded to list off a whole host of things I wasn’t ready to hear.
I wasn’t ready to hear about God’s tangible love for me. I could understand God’s love for the world as a whole. I could grasp Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice. But I couldn’t fathom that God’s love could be deeply personal.
God is love, but really? What about all the smiting in the Old Testament? How do I reconcile how much suffering there is on earth with the “love” that is supposed to be present?
Now, I feel as though I've grasped maybe 10% more of God’s unending, abounding love, both for me, for others, and for all of creation. For me, that journey began with learning to love myself.
It was difficult to understand God’s love if I couldn’t first extend compassion to the complicated, wounded, and difficult places within myself.
When Jesus says in Matthew 5:44 to “love your enemies,” I wonder if we can be our own worst enemies. Perhaps one pathway into experiencing God’s love is to remind ourselves that we are worthy of God’s love. Not just our neighbors. Not just our enemies. Me. Myself. You.
The practice of Loving Kindness Meditation, * or metta, helped me extend to myself the same love and grace I so readily offer to others.
Loving-kindness meditations often start with:
May I be safe.
May I be healthy.
May I be happy.
May I be at ease.
May I be filled with loving-kindness.
May I be peaceful.**
Once loving-kindness has been extended to us, then to those with whom we struggle, and finally to the whole world.
Where are you being called to extend 10% more loving-kindness to yourself? And from that place of loving-kindness, where can you then extend it to others, settled in the knowledge that God loves you, too?
May love be your way.
The twenty-fourth reflection is from Anna Schmunk a graduate of WTC's Spiritual Direction program.
* Link: https://shambhala.org/community/blog/loving-kindness meditation-3-guided-meditations-and-scripts/ *
* **Source: https://www.lionsroar.com/metta-meditation-guide/
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