Love means showing others—and yourself—the beauty God sees, even when it’s hard to recognize it.
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada asking, what does it mean to love? Well, my friend Chantal Huinink puts it this way; she says, “Love is showing someone the beauty that God sees in them, when they cannot see it themselves.” You know, I laugh because Chantal is a young woman with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy—her arms and legs are affected, along with her vision and speech. Yet Chantal has embraced the truth in Ecclesiastes 3 where we’re told, “God has made everything beautiful.” Legs and arms that don’t work? Yes, they are beautiful. A frame that is too small or eyes that do not see or joints that swell? Stunning, handsome, beautiful, I say! Oh friend, perhaps you know someone who is really struggling with self-image [it may even be you]. If so, I encourage you to love yourself and your neighbor with the love of our Heavenly Father, the one who created you to reflect His image and His character.
© Joni and Friends