“Love bears all things.” {1 Cor. 13:7}

“Love covers a multitude of sins.” {1 Peter 4:8}

“Perfect love casts out fear.” {1 John 4:18}

“We love because He first loved us.” {1 John 4:19}

I open my mouth. Pain flies from tongue as I spit undeserved words upon someone. Why? Why do I insist on opening my mouth? Why do I bite? Why do I hurt?

One word: Insecurity. My heartbeat quickens when I hear someone say something. My thoughts begin to race. What did they mean by that? Do they dislike me? Are they mad at me? Do they think I’m a terrible person? And so, in true fashion to my sinful nature, I have to ensure that they don’t hurt me as much I hurt them. So I open my mouth. Out floods pain. And all too often, this pain is not undone as easily as it is inflicted.

I think I am finally realizing that every reaction I make affects someone. And it is no longer just my family who knows me, but people who I really want to impress and really want to be liked by. And that’s a scary place to be. That’s a place where I have placed my identity in how someone else feels about me. That’s a place where I have placed my happiness in the hands of another human, and asked them to perform to make me feel a certain way. That’s a place where I take control away from God, where I ignore how much He loves me, and I look for ways to feel more loved. As if anyone could love more than my Savior.

Where does that lead? Insecurity. Doubt. Fear. Anger. Hurt.

So I begin to search. I begin to search for an answer to the hurt. The hurt I see in other’s eyes, and in my own. I begin to wonder if it’s really my battle to fight, to ensure that everyone likes me as much as I feel I need to be liked to be fulfilled. And in that searching I find these words. “Love covers a multitude of sins.”

A multitude of sins. A multitude of anger, gossip, malice, selfishness, envy, and strife. When I truly love like Christ has loved me, I’m no longer concerned with how people feel about me, or how I feel about them. No, my feelings have no place in love. Because I am called to love, regardless of my heart that is condemning me with every passing day. I am called to hide my life away in Christ’s, not to generously give other people the power to falsely fulfill me. I am called to look up to a Savior who became love as He took on that multitude of sins. 

So when I look into the eyes of the people who have hurt me, and when I look into the eyes of people I have hurt, I dig deeper. I open up my chest, and I cut my heart once again, forcing out one more drop of blood, one more drop of love.

When I truly look into the mirror of others, I see myself. I see my sin, my hurt, my wreckage. I recoil. I hate seeing my own filth personified. My feelings betray me. My deceptively wicked heart screams for me to flee. Flee to false safety. Flee to false comfort. Flee to sin. I look in the mirror of another’s eyes, and I see broken, chipped mirror edges that cut my fingers and my life when I touch them. My first instinct: Push them away, so that my broken edges can’t cut them. Push them away, so their broken edges can’t cut me.

And then I hear the sound of Jesus, crying “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do,” as He bled out in agony on the Cross. And so I reach out. I touch.

That is grace. That is love. Grace and love are bleeding out because you chose to touch the sharp, jagged edges of others. Touching the edges, because of the hand of Jesus touching my heart, restoring it. Because when I cut open my heart for unconditional love, I am cutting open the heart of Jesus Christ as He hung dying on a cross for me. As He breathed His last, He bled out every drop of His love so that every heartbeat that ever sounds on earth can find grace. Can find unconditional love. Love costs everything. Yet it is not my price to pay, because He has already paid it in full.

Love bears all things. |1 Cor. 13:7| All. The messy, broken pieces of me. The messy, broken pieces of you.

We love because He first loved us. 
|1 John 4:19| Without Him, loving anyone would be impossible. Without Him filling us with His love first, we would be completely desolate. Because we are messy, broken pieces.

Love covers a multitude of sins. |1 Peter 4:8|And yet, a multitude of messy, broken pieces are covered when we love.

When we bear all, through His love, we are restored. We are redeemed. We are love. So I will reach out. I will choose to place my insecurity and identity in the One who taught me to love. And I will touch the edges of people’s lives, if only because Christ chose to touch the edges of mine forever.