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All About Love
February 19, 2026
Deuteronomy 30:15-20|Psalm 1|Luke 9:18-25
Having just come through our journey receiving the light of Christ to bring love and joy in a world that seems so dark, here we are again at the beginning of another journey. It’s a story we all know, God’s gift of love to us, the offering of God’s Son on a cross so that we might have eternal life. How do we respond to that? Thomas Merton summed it up in his words:
“There is something in the depths of our being that hungers for wholeness and finality. Because we are made for eternal life, we are made for an act that gathers up all the power and capacities of our being and offers them simultaneously and forever to God.”
How do we do this in an ever-changing world? It can be so overwhelming. Lent, according to the Church, is a time for repentance, for journeying towards renewal. It can be a deep cleanse of the corners of our lives that we tend to not look at. Our prayers and worship become solemn with our own darkness and can be downright depressing. I rather think God’s focus for Lent would be the light of God’s all-encompassing love for us, forever.
In the readings for today, we are once again challenged to choose life, to live holy, to become like a tree planted by water, to ‘bear the fruit’ of God’s love. We pray, we worship, we feed and clothe others; we follow the path we have been taught. But when was the last time we were actually quiet and told God how much we love him? When was the last time we spoke the words “I love you, Jesus”?
Love is a two-way street, a relationship with God means sharing the love back.
Is that hard? Is it inconvenient? It’s like any other relationship – it takes conversation, it takes time, it takes a willingness to let Jesus walk with us, not just following behind him. It means being able to ask God to heal and give wisdom as an ambulance passes by. It means “seeing” those in front of us in the line at the store and asking God “is there something I can do”. It means being open to hearing God’s words whispered in the early morning, in a meeting, not just when it’s convenient. In our real world, love isn’t convenient; it is an ever-changing relationship between the Almighty Creator and us. This Lent I don’t want to be a convenient Christian, I want to be inconvenienced by God because His love for me is everything. I want to say every day, “I love you, Lord.” Will you join me?
Cindy Lovejoy
