“And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them” – 1 John 4:16

The verse above really troubled me in the last few months. I’ve been reading it over and over again, and sometimes it makes me sad, because with all the things happened in my life, I can’t feel God’s love inside me, nor my love for God.

But in the last few weeks, all of those feelings are gone, and I can proudly say that I can really feel God’s love, and I’ve fallen in love with God all over again.

In this post, I will try to share my journey of finding God’s love back again. But let me tell you this secret : To be able to find God’s love, we need to know what love really is.

There are 4 characteristics of love, may it for others or for God, that I quoted from Rick Warren.

1 . Love is a choice

Yes, sometimes we might get attracted or aroused by something uncontrollably, but that’s not love. That’s infatuation.

Love is a choice, and God give us freedom to choose love or hate, not only when it comes to Him, but also when it comes to everything. We can choose to love or hate those people who annoyed us, because God has given us heart and brain to make that decision.

And of course, to fall in love with God, we need to choose to love Him. But..

2. Love is an action

But love is nothing without an action. We can say we love someone, but if our actions do not represent love, that’s not really love.

Therefore, we need to show we love God. How? By showing commitments to spend time with Him, obey His words, and keep our faith in Him.

3 . Love is a Skill

A skill means it’s something that can be practiced, and God wants us to be a master at it. It might be hard at first to love others, especially those who hurt us or those who are just so annoying. When it comes to God, it is even harder. Falling in love with God isn’t the same as falling in love with other human being. When we fall in love with God, we fall in love with someone we can’t see, or touch.

But we need and we can learn to do all that. How? By practicing. Start by showing love to those who are lovable first, then it will become …

4 . Love is a habit

Once you practiced love everyday, it’s starting to become a habit. You’ll become better at it and one day you will be able to love anyone, even those who hurt you.

And that’s when God will feel loved, because He is happy when we love His creations, and making Him happy is one way to proof we love Him.

My personal experience

It might seems hard at first. But let me share a little bit of personal experience. 

Because I made a choice to love God (step 1), I decided I need to make actions (step 2). I realize the easiest way to show my love is by spending time with Him, and I committed myself to have alone time with God every night after I got home from my daily activities. I prayed and worship Him, and I read His words.

At the first week, I still don’t feel anything, but I keep on developing my skill to love (step 3). On the second week,  things started to change. I started to drop tears, sometimes tons of them, everytime I worship Him, and I can feel His love runs in my veins. And now, it has become a habit (step 4).

But this is just an example of one way showing God we love Him. We still need to do it through giving our best for Him, serving Him, doing good, and a lot other things.

Conclusion

It’s not easy to love anyone, especially God. But if we decide to love Him, we should take action and keep on doing it until it become a habit.

Hopefully this post helped you as much as it helped me.

God bless.