With Perfect Love and Forgiveness

Jeremiah 17:9

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

We are commanded to love one another as we love ourselves.  How can we be commanded to take on such an impossible task?  Does God not know how incapable our hearts are to fulfill this commandment?

Of course He does.  That is why He gave us His Son, Jesus, to be Our Savior.  Jesus is the expression of the perfect love and forgiveness of Our Heavenly Father.  When we receive Jesus as Our Savior, we receive the capacity to love as God does.  Through our salvation, we are able to free ourselves from our judgmental natures and our cynical hearts.  We are able to free ourselves from demanding of others what they cannot give.  We are able to free ourselves from every disillusioned thought that our deceitful heart contrives against others.  

So, are we able to love one another as we love ourselves?  Of course we are.  When we allow the Holy Spirit to work in our lives, we are able love one another with perfect love and forgiveness just as The Father loves us. 

Prayer

Heavenly Father, we thank You for revealing the wickedness in our hearts.  We thank You for providing Your Son, Jesus, so that we have a way to overcome our selfish natures.  We praise You for giving us the capability to share Your perfect love and forgiveness with the world around us.  We pray that the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit will aid us and strengthen us to love others just as You love us.