WEDNESDAY: Reduce Me to Love

I am a Joyce Meyer fan as I believe I have mentioned before. I try to catch her show every morning to kick my day off in the right direction. I am very skeptical of most of the other programs on the channel, but I have found Joyce to be sincere and reliable over the years.

Several of her messages this year have been about accepting God's love and realizing that He loves you without condition. I am good at talking that talk but as a recovering perfectionist, I don't always internalize that message well. I have really enjoyed this book. Not only does it address God's love for me, but it also challenges me to love others well.

I found one part particularly interesting - how we think about others. I was prepared for the passages about how to show love, but Joyce challenges readers to consider how we THINK about love and about those to whom we should show love. The way I think and the way I truly am in my heart will come out in my conversation and my behavior. If there is a difficult person in my life, I am challenged not only to show that personal love as described in Scripture, but I also have to examine how I think about that person. I have to choose to stop negative thoughts (like "I can't stand how negative that person is" or "She is just never going to change") and replace them with positive and loving thoughts.

Do you really want to love like God loves? Check out Reduce Me to Love.