Sometimes loving is hard

Jesus told his disciples, and through them, the whole world the two most important things we should be about:
Love the Lord you God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all our mind. Secondly, we are to love our neighbors like ourselves.
With just these two things, if we could really just do them, we would accomplish everything that we were ever meant to do. Everything!

I think that deep down; everyone desires to do just this but….. sometimes loving is hard.

To love God wholly and completely. What does it mean? Can we possibly comprehend loving anyone in that way? At the very least, this would include doing everything possible to want to please that person and never allow any of our actions to offend or hurt them. In our personal relationships with those around us, it is often very hard not to offend someone. Not because we do something wrong, but rather because the other person cannot see or understand our real motives. With God at least that is never a problem since God sees into the very core of our being. There is nothing hidden from Him. God knows when we don’t want to offend or hurt Him, but at the same time He also knows when we are apathetic or flat out rebellious towards Him.
Often we tell people close to us that we love them with all our hearts. It just isn’t true, because there is no way we can give all of the love within us to just one person without leaving out others or ourselves. Often, we would rather have our desires met before looking out for the needs, wants, and desires of others. Be honest. Then too, sometimes even after we do something kind or loving towards others, we may secretly, deep down want some sort of recognition for it. It may be something as simple as a “thank you”. Even if it was just wanting that much, it means in a small sense that our motives weren’t entirely selfless.
I believe that Jesus Christ offered to the entire world from eternity past until eternity future complete, unselfish, pure love without expecting anything in return. It’s been said that there was no need for them to nail Jesus to the cross; His love would have held Him there. Could we ever imagine experiencing the things that happened for a perfect stranger who even may even have hate and malice towards you? I don’t think that God ever calls us to go to that extent in showing love to others but I know we are supposed to do so much more than we are used to doing.
Every one of us has things which we are committed to. That isn’t a bad thing, and we should be diligent to carry out our responsibilities. Some of those things; in no special order are, family, church, work, school, relationships. We should all have a desire to play an active role in things like these, but there needs to remain a balance in our lives so that there is time and room in our hearts to reach out and love others in tangible ways. Even for people in “full time ministry”, too often more time is spent on “ministry” organization and administration activities rather than on personal involvement with others.
All I’m trying to say is that for us to really love others, it takes more than just saying “I love you”. It takes help from God and so we should ask for that help. Then maybe we can be more like the people God wants us to be. I hope and pray to become that person.