"The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: "I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness."' (Jeremiah 31:3, NIV)

This has been one of my favourite scriptures for many years. However, I don’t think I always believed it!

Love has always been a very strange concept to me, especially the kind that is unconditional.  Love in my life has, for the most part, been very conditional: “If you do this for me then you love me,” and vice versa.

Growing up, the way that love was expressed in my house was that you’d get a gift if you'd been treated poorly, instead of an apology.  As a child, this meant to me that I was loved, because I got gifts.

In my adult relationships, I would often express my love to a partner by buying gifts, rather than showing love in my actions.  To me, that was enough; “I gave you something, so there - I love you!”  But it is only after receiving God’s unconditional love that I started realising that that kind of love was very unhealthy and untrue. 

Slowly but surely, in my walk with the Lord, God started to change my notion of love into a true indication of what love really is.  God started to flood my life with “agape” love, which means “unconditional love”, or as C.S. Lewis put it in his book, ‘The Four Loves’:

“Agape love is the highest level of love known to humanity - a selfless love, a love that was passionately committed to the well-being of the other.”

Through some of the awesome teachings at DGFC’s Home Groups about love, God has really been talking to me about receiving God’s love by doing selfless random acts of love to those around me.  The more I love others, the more I understand God’s love for me.  It is a crazy notion, as we are often taught in the world to only look out for “Numero Uno”!  But God’s kingdom teaches us to look out for others.

Love is God’s currency.  It is a currency that can never be over-spent or that you can run out of!  So I’m learning to spend God’s currency liberally, and am being so blessed in return: it truly is more blessed to give than to receive. (Acts 20:35)

Let’s get out there and love well, spending God’s currency with fervour!

Brigitte Petrick
Intercessory Ministry DGFC
www.deogloriakzn.co.za