I have a picture in my office that says...
I was such a fortunate child to have been the recipient of unconditional love from both of my parents. The kind of love that is always there and is not used as a carrot or stick or chess piece. The kind of love that caused me to never spend a single moment wondering whether I was loved. I think that is why I have this picture in front of me every day at work. It seems to remind me that in the simplest terms, God loves us so much that we get as many chances as we need and love is always available.
Love, grace, forgiveness, mercy . . . these are the gifts that God is always eager to offer us and yet, how often do we simply turn them down? Sometimes, we allow our guilt and shame to take over and we reject the gift of forgiveness. Sometimes we allow our feelings of being unworthy to cause us to turn away from God’s gift of grace. At other times, we invest in our anger and bitterness such that we are unable to receive God’s love and mercy.
I invite you this week to work hard on noticing where you focus your thoughts, where you expend your energy and how you withhold your love because of fear, anger, disappointment and loss. Quantum physics tells us that whatever we focus on expands so it is no small thing to notice where you focus is.
Do you really want more negativity in your life as the result of focusing your thoughts on negative things?
Do you really want more bitterness, anger and disappointment in your life as the result of expending your energy on being angry and unforgiving?
Do you really want more fear in your life because you continually withhold love?
I fairly certain that none of us consciously want these things but I’m equally certain that we often walk around unconscious and don’t pay attention to the ways we are rejecting and turning away from the sweetness of God’s unconditional love for us.
“Lean in” my friends. It can’t hurt to see if anticipating and focusing on these gifts just might cause them to manifest themselves! The secret about God’s unconditional love? It is always there and God is always ready for you to have it . . . so the power to receive it is all up to you. Open your heart to it and just sit back and see what God can do.