Dear Ones,
Hope you are enjoying each day with the Lord and letting the Spirit infuse you with His love. The question for you today is: Do you feel you are more self-less today than you were in the past? What things has God used in your life to help you be centered on Him and others?
Devotions from Judy’s heart
I am enjoying more time with the Lord since I am not writing and sending out devotionals every day. But I am also seeing more of my selfish ways and need for His healing love to transform me. I’m sure I miss opportunities He sends to serve others and to share His love when I am on my time schedule and not His.

I am reading Healed by Love by Carmelite Friar Daniel Chowning, and see how important it is to open ourselves to the inflow of His Spirit. We cannot love others if we are not infused with God’s love, for our love is selfish. Jesus’ love is selfless, compassionate, merciful and forgiving, and ours is not. Friar Daniel writes of the Dark Night as “being a journey of love, rooted in lived experience, a journey from selfish, possessive love to love simply for the other, free from egotistic demands and possessiveness.” To bring us to that place, we may experience many trials in our lives so we can abandon ourselves to the Lord. These may include humiliations, conflicts in relationships, failures, illnesses, etc. God uses those things to purify, heal and transform us. Instead of attempting to get out of trying circumstances quickly, it is better when we learn what the Lord is trying to teach us that we may love better.

God wants to refine each one of us to be more selfless, so we shouldn’t be surprised if He takes us through the Dark Night. It is a time of purification as He frees us from those things that hinder our relationship with Him. Even when we may feel it is a time of dryness, God has purpose in it as He wants to purge us and let His purifying grace change us…that includes our words, our actions and even our thoughts. I see my need of that more and more.

Let us all be receptive to how God leads us, even when it may be through darkness, trials and suffering. Perhaps it is the very way our hearts will be directed toward loving God with our whole heart, mind and strength.
Challenge for today: Say yes to the Lord if He sends you dryness or conflicts, asking that His love heal and transform you and draw you closer to Him.
Blessings on your day and prayers and love, Judy