John 15:17 This is my command.  Love each other.

I have been consumed with thoughts about this scripture and what “love” means for months now. The Lord calls us to love Him and to love people.   In my opinion, love is an underestimated word. People dont seem to realize the ultimate power that word, love, holds.  Love outshines hate, love conquers all.  The hate that is being demonstrated in our everyday lives should be overshawdowed with the LOVE.   As Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.  Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” We are in charge of how we treat others. We are in charge of how we react or respond to others, and with all of that power we have it’s difficult to understand the amount of “hate” we are seeing these days.  I don’t believe that our world is full of that much hate, I just don’t.  I think that social media and the media itself make our world look a whole lot more gloomy than it is.  I’m sure there are many loving things happening in our world, people helping people, loving on each other and caring about what happens no matter our race, religion, political affliation or socio-economic class. I know that everyday in my life, I see love happening around me.  Not just family love, but when people allow you in front of them on the highway; or when someone pays for your coffee in front of you at the local coffee shop; when your co-workers are concerned for you and your life outside of work; when a person drops their keys and a total stranger bends down to pick it up for them.  I see these everyday and it warms my heart. In times of tragedy we do hear more reports of this love and kindness,  but it tends to be so brief.  The good stories are placed out there in our universe for a short time, and it doesn’t take long for those on social media or for the media itself, to seize hold of a “bad” or “negative” moment and begin spreading that hate instead.  Hate takes the front seat when we allow it to.  We are designed to love and to be in relationships.   We ARE the power, we ARE the love and we ARE the light…it only takes US to reach out, respond or react in such a way.  It’s also up to us to put it out there, to challenge ourselves to only share the love and the light, and not share the negative, the hateful or the bad.   We can help heal our nation with lots of positive stories and acts of love and kindness taking place everyday across our world.  Will you take charge of your actions?