“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.”Jesus loves us as His Father loved Him?  Can you even imagine that kind of love.  I have heard people talk about a father’s love before.  It is not as if I can’t imagine what a father’s love is like. I have a father and he has an amazing love.  I also have three children and I know how much I love them.  I am sure a mother’s love is similar to a fathers love.  Yet, even knowing all this, I understand that the love God had for His son is so much greater than anything we are capable of.We live in a broken world.  We don’t know perfect love because we are not perfect people.  There are so many different types of love in the world today and so many varying degrees of love.  We use the world love a lot.  We say we love pizza and we say we love our children.  Is it the same love?  Then there are some people who have never felt love and so they don’t know how to love or to be loved.  I guess what I find most hard to comprehend is how Jesus could love us like His father loved Him.  I know knew my Father’s love, however, I don’t love everyone like my father loved me.  However, writing that statement did make me wonder, maybe I do love everyone like my father loved me.  What I mean by this is we learn how to love from our parents, from those around us, those that raised us.  However, we were shown love, that is how we tend to give love.  For instance, my parents were very generous and giving people.  They would give their last dollar to someone in need even if that meant that they did not know how they were going to feed their children.  The welcomed people into the family after just meeting them.  You were treated like family, even if we just met you.  This was passed down to all 11 of us children.  We tend to give love pretty freely because we got love pretty freely.  If you are raised in a home where you have to work hard for love and recognition, then you will most likely be cautious when handing out your love.  People will need to work hard to earn it.  If your parents were very selective with who they loved and trusted then you will probably be too.  I know this is nothing new.  We take after our parents.  This makes sense, they are our first teachers.  I guess I just never really thought of it in this way until now.  In this way, it makes total sense that Jesus would love us as his Father loved Him.  That is what we all do.  We love like our parents love.  Now, some of you may not have received a lot of love, or any love growing up.  If this is you, I don’t want you to think that all is lost.  That if you don’t like the way your parents loved that you are doomed to love like they did forever.  You can change, you can grow.  You can decide  how you want to love others.  Just like with all things that we want to change, all we need to do is look to our Heavenly Father.  He is an example of perfect love.  We can look to see what He did, how He treated people, and most importantly, how He loved people.  Reading through the bible is a great way to study God’s love and the New Testament is a great way to study Jesus’s love as well.  They have a perfect love that even though we can’t love exactly like they did, we can try to love more and more like they did.What is their love like?  Their love is completely unconditional.  They loved you from the beginning and there is nothing you can do to make them love you any more or any less.  They do not hold grudges.  They do not withhold their love when they get upset.  They do not play favorites.  Their love is not dependent on their mood or whether or not they had a bad day.  Their love is not dependent on your behavior or your mood.  Their love is available to one and all.  There is a Series called “The Chosen.”  It is amazing, if you have not watched it yet, you should go look it up immediately after you finish this podcast.  It is a series of episodes depicting Jesus’s three years in ministry.  It will be broken up into 7 seasons.  They are releasing season 2 currently.  One of the reasons I love this series so much is because you get to see Jesus’s life enacted out.  You are not just reading about His life, you get to see him live it.  I love it so much because you can see how much Jesus loves the world.  Every time he interacts with anyone He does it with some much love and caring.  You can see it in his smile, in his eyes, in his whole presence.  It is truly amazing.The bible is full of stories where Jesus is filled with compassion and helps people.  There are many stories where those around Him don’t understand what He is doing.  Even people that are the closest to Him sometimes struggle to understand his level of love.  Loving like Jesus loved is not easy.  I have heard people say, “Jesus loved the unlovable.”  He hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors.  He spent time with the lame and the blind.  He touched the lepers and talked with the woman at the well that was an outcast.  How many of us can say the same?  How many of us can say we love everyone, no matter who they are and what they have done?  I am going to guess many of us struggle with this.  I know I do.  I know I struggle to love the person the cuts in front of me in traffic.  I also struggle to love the kids that says unkind things to other children.  I struggle to love those I don’t understand.  I am sure my list of those I struggle to love could go on.  What about you?  Are there people you struggle to love?We are all called to love others.  In fact, When Jesus was asked in Matthew 22:36 which is the greatest commmandent, Jesus answered in verses 37-40 “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” So first, we need to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind and soul.  I think we all know this and find this a little easier than the next commandment.  However, depending on our relationship with God, we may have some work to do in this area as well.  Second, we need to love our neighbor as ourselves.  Well, this one is not as easy.  Sometimes our neighbors aren’t so nice.  There are plenty of people in this world that many would consider “unloveable” and yet, that is exactly what God is calling us to do, love them.  Next it says that all the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.  If everything hangs on these two commandments, then it seems pretty important that we get these two right.  How could you be better at loving your neighbor?  Is there anything you need to do to love the Lord our God with all your heart, mind and soul?  The scripture I started with said “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.”  I don’t want to leave you today without spending a minute to draw your attention to those four small words.  I know I talked a lot about love today and how we are called to love.  I do think it is important that we look at how we love others and to see how we can love others better.  However, I think it is equally important to mention that Jesus said to abide in His love.  Jesus loves us with an unconditional perfect love, and he wants us to abide in that love. When I looked up the definition of abide it said acceptance.  I think this is important to note because some people have a hard time accepting love.  Are you abiding in Jesus’s love?  Can you accept that He loves you perfectly, just the way you are?   Do you struggle to accept that He could love you the way His father loved Him.  If not, that is great!  If you do, don’t worry. You are not alone in this.  Many people struggle to believe they are loved like this.  If you want to abide in His love and you don’t know how, tell God.  He knows your past, he knows your struggles.  Ask God to help you abide in His love and He will.  He is up there just waiting for you to ask.  Dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much for being with us today and everyday. Thank you for loving us so perfectly.  Lord, if there is anything in us that is blocking this love, we ask you today to remove it.  Lord, We ask you to help us love better.  We want to love like you love.  We want to follow in your footsteps and love our neighbors the way you love us.  Lord, you created all of us in your likeness and image.  Help us to see people the way you see people.  Help us to see others through our eyes.  Lord, we all had different experiences with love growing up.  I ask that you fill us up with your love and help us to feel what perfect love feels like.  You are truly amazing Lord and we are so very thankful for all that you do for us.  Help us to see that your love is all we need Lord.  Please heal any hearts that need to be healed and help all of us that struggle with loving others.  Father, I ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’s holy name, Amen.