Self-Love (Part 3)
O God,
Your Son taught us that we are to love our neighbor as ourselves.
But what does it mean for us to love ourselves?
After all, sometimes we think less of ourselves than we should; sometimes we are too hard on ourselves and sometimes we beat ourselves up over some falling or some failure. Our self-love can, because we are sinners, get twisted into self-hatred, self-loathing, and self-abuse.
Surely we are not to show our love for our neighbor in such ways. Surely we are not to show our love for ourselves in such ways.
Help us to experience and to embrace your gracious forgiveness so deeply that we can move toward forgiving ourselves and, having been forgiven by you and by self, we can love our neighbors by extending such grace and forgiveness to them.
Help us to love our neighbors as ourselves through experiencing and sharing your grace and forgiveness.
Amen.
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