Our Need to Feel Loved, Valued, and Accepted
I believe the new explosion in blogging is a portrait of people needing to be heard, to be understood, and to be accepted.
How is it that we fret over the number of pages we read in our Bible and count the number of minutes on our knees, but ignore the deep emotional needs of our brothers and sisters in Christ ?
Love comes from God. The love in us flows directly from Him.
Judgmental Christians
It is said the Christian army is the only one that shoots its wounded. Instead of trying to understand, we condemn and criticize—the result of superior and judgmental attitudes .
Sad to say, there is more condemnation inside the church than outside. There is a history of Christians seeing specks in others’ eyes and ignoring the logs in their own eyes.
He who says he is in the light, & hates his brother is in darkness until now. He who loves his brother abides in the light & there is no cause for stumbling in him. (1 John 2:9–10)
The absence of love is evidence that a person does not know God. Since God is love, intimate acquaintance with Him will produce love. Love is intrinsic to the character and nature of God; God’s love is not a feeling, but action.
God knows our deepest hurts and secret shame and accepts us because of His Son. Shouldn’t Christians do likewise?
If we claim to be part of the family of God and derive our source from Him we must express the love of God.
Jesus Understood and Loved
The Samaritan Woman
The Samaritan woman felt worthless, abandoned, and unloved after five husbands. Jesus knew and understood. He offered her forgiveness and love in a nonjudgmental way. Jesus understood what she needed—to feel loved, valued, and accepted. And He knew a relationship with Him would fulfill that need.
Mary’s Perfume
Mary’s act of love, anointing Christ’s feet with perfume, was not understood and was criticized by the disciples. But when his disciples saw it, they had indignation, saying, To what purpose is this waste? …
But Jesus understood! When Jesus understood it, he said unto them, Why trouble ye the woman? for she hath wrought a good work upon me. Jesus demonstrated beautiful, wonderful, faith, hope, and love.
Only through Jesus and God’s Holy Spirit can we have the faith to change a selfish heart into a heart of love that gives a blessed hope for the future.
Second Greatest Command
As a tree bears fruit and grows in size, so the Gospel produces spiritual fruit in believers. When we take the time to listen and understand, we can help bring healing and restoration to others and fulfill the second greatest command, to love one another.
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. (1 John 4:7)
Someone you know has a need to feel loved, valued, and accepted. Listen to them this week. Be the one to listen, hear, understand and love.
Love them where they are as God loves us where we are.
Beautifully written. Thanks for the reminder. Even when we are the ones needing to feel loved, and accepted, we can reach out to others on God’s behalf for it is HIM in us doing the loving. We have been given everything we need for loving others – His grace and mercy!
Thanks Robin. I needed to read this tonight. I am guilty of not always giving the love I need to.
I pray I can do that this week.
Love to you~
Your post dovetails beautifully with a book my church is doing as a Bible study: The Prodigal God by Tim Keller. When we become judgmental like the elder brother in the parable of the prodigal son, we drive away people from the church. I love this quote:
“What makes you faithful or generous is not just a redoubled effort to follow moral rules. Rather, all change comes from deepening your understanding of the salvation of Christ and living out of the changes that understanding creates in your heart. Faith in the gospel restructures our motivations, our self-understanding, our identity, and our view of the world. Behavioral compliance to rules without heart-change will be superficial and fleeting.”
.-= Tammy´s last blog ..Dust Bunnies, Faceblindness and Other Stuff =-.
‘need/feel/loved/valued/accepted’
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Yahshua told those around Him that they could not be His Disciples because they valued the approval of men instead of the Approval of Yhwh the Only Creator.
(Yes, Yahshua knows the Creator’s Name, and it is in every Book throughout Scripture in the Hebrew Language but edited entirely out of almost all english language Bibles)
Yahshua told His Disciples that they would be kicked out of public, religious, and political meeting places if they took a stand for TRUTH. This is so, even today, throughout the u.s.a….
All of society is permeated with evil.(mostly greed and idolatry). So don’t be surprised, ekklesia, that you meet such resistance and even violent opposition as you grow in Love and Grace and Truth – the world cannot understand and will not accept you, exactly as written in Scripture.