21 Days of Listening Day 21: It is all about LOVE.

As these 21 days come to a close the Holy Spirit is really showing me the importance of love.

Love is the most powerful force on this earth. God is love and therefore when we love we are moving fully in the power of the Lord. This is why forgiveness is so important.

Unforgiveness is like having a clogged artery. The more unforgiveness we have in our heart, the harder it is for the Holy Spirit to move in our lives. This is what it means to have a hardened heart. A hardened heart cannot support the spiritual lives that we are destined to have.

But when those clogs are removed through forgiveness, we are once again filled with the Spirit. We are filled with God’s love and our heart becomes soft and pliable to His will. We are able to move in power and authority not because we are powerful, but because we have submitted to HIS authority.

But it all starts with love, and love often starts with forgiveness.

During these 21 days I have experienced some challenges, but they have all been dwarfed by the triumphs. And all of these triumphs started with love.

We quiet the mind by knowing that God first loved us so we can love Him. We can give Him our cares and worries and focus on what is happening today.

We can discern what we hear in our quiet time with one simple tool: Love. If what we hear is coming from a loving place then we know it is of God. After all, Jesus did say that loving God and our neighbors as ourselves sums up all of the law. Love is of God, everything else is not.

Once we hear from God and know for certain that it is Him who is talking we can take action. This is what allowed me to reconcile things with my mother and my friend. I know that confessing my unforgiveness and repenting to my mother is something that is in line with God’s love. I also know that repenting to my friend for how I approached him and asking his forgiveness while sharing the Gospel is from God as well.

It was all rooted in love.

Sometimes things aren’t so easy in the moment. Our minds like to make things complicated with worry and fear. As you go beyond these 21 days and continue to practice silently listening to the Lord it will become much easier.

With God, things are very simple. We are the ones that make them complicated.