Cover of love

I had for many a day read the scripture that reads, "love covers a multitude of sins" but the impact and truth of these words had not occurred to me until recently. I will tell you the story.
Having had a friend for close to a year who I looked up to especially on entrepreneurial  terms, I was once required to give an evaluation of him. I was very positive in my report, giving my honest opinion as at that time, despite his unpopularity with the rest of the team. They thought he was boring. I didn't. About a fortnight later, I needed something from the said friend as a matter of urgency.... something within his ability. He very rudely turned me down, saying something to the effect that I did not deserve the assistance. I was shocked by his words, staring in disbelief hoping someone would wake me up. It was one rude awakening. I walked away thinking I would never stand his sight again.
The next time I was to interact with him, I couldn't help but notice how boring he was. Come to think of it, he always talked a bit too much, right? How could I not have seen? I didn't seem to mind earlier, but after my change of heart, I could barely stand him.
He had not changed. My heart had. The cover of love had been lifted off my eyes. That which covers a multitude of sin and weaknesses.
(Proverbs 10:12) Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all sins- in some versions, weaknesses.
Have you ever been in a relationship, and just when it goes sour you look at the person and wonder what you had seen in them?
Have you ever had interest in a lady and just when she rejects you, you notice that her teeth are crooked?
Have you ever disagreed with your friend then suddenly noticed that her jokes are actually not funny, or her accent is weird?
I am sure you have heard of people who suddenly say that their spouse, or fiance is  not who they thought they were, and the thing they say is actually not a new trait in the accused...
I cannot for one second try to rule out the fact that people change, but many times, the love faded away, probably after a disappointment or fight with the person, or having your attention drift to another interest, at the expense of the first.
They said love is blind, then beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.
Love does not see flaw... It understands that flaws are there, they just don't appear in its line of vision. If the beholder has love, the thing is beautiful. If the beholder lacks love, the thing is not beautiful.
You view things from your perspective. From the veil over your eyes. If your eyes are covered with love, you see beauty. If they are veiled with hatred, you see ugliness...
The flaws had been there before, except love had covered them.
When you start focusing on the flaws and weaknesses of another, you can barely stand them...
Conflict is an inevitable part of any relationship where two individuals are real to each other... Parent-child, brother-sister, friends, spouses, etc. When they do arise, view each other with love and fight the issue, not each other. Hate the problem, not each other.
Let love cover the multitude of weaknesses your neighbor has. Let love cover the fact that she sings off-key. Let it cover your spouse's weaknesses, and they are many. This is not to say that you should be silent when someone does wrong, but could you please fight the ill and not the person? Can you correct them lovingly?
Pretending is very different from loving. Taking an example of a man whose wife always make saltless food that he doesn't like, he has two options: Pretend that he doesn't mind when really he does, and he will slowly develop a distaste for her cooking, and y'all know the repercussions of this... or he can lovingly correct her and ask for more salt in her cooking, as he commends her for the job that far.
Pretending always grows tired and it will boil over in a moment of pressure, while the loving correction will yield the desired fruit, with no negative effect.
I know... I know... There are those veeeery "unlovable" people. You know that type that is always up in your business sourcing for something to gossip about over all social media, the type that doesn't seem to understand that mobile phones are not public booths ( they don't seem to understand the meaning of 'private' and 'personal'), that neighbor who just won't stop telling everyone who cares to listen how lately you seem to be barely living, that your house rarely smells of food, and that girl who just won't stop sneering at you... I know those are there, I have met my share of them. But what would  Jesus say to you?
(Matthew 5:43-48) "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, love your enemies , bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so? Therefore you shall be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect."

Yes, we should love even them whom we think don't deserve it. That is what Jesus did for you and I!
Decide to live a life of selfless love. Even when you stand to gain nothing, just love anyway. If God chose to love only those who deserved it, and hate those who deserved it, what side of the divide would you be on?
(John 13:35) "By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."
Be true to God and to yourself and ask Him to  fill your heart with love. If you particularly find it hard to love a specific person, tell it to the Lord and ask that He give you a heart like His, to love even them who don't deserve it.
Speak life and speak love.

Let it go

There was once a woman walking along a long winding path, whose end she could not see. On her back was load heavier than her weight. She took every painful step slowly, growing weary by the minute. Her back was in excruciating pain, soles bleeding from the rocks scratching at them, and palms losing grip of this luggage... She remembered how she had left for greener pastures, and how that far, life had been nothing but painful.
Lost in thought, she did not realize that a pick-up truck had come up and stopped right where she was. A kind-looking young man went up to greet her very warmly and extended an invitation to her to hitch a ride. She was grateful, wondering how and why this young man would be so kind to a stranger, and accepted smiling. The kind man asked for her luggage to place it in the back of his truck, but she held on to it firmly, and shook her head. She was so used to carrying it, she could not imagine releasing it to a total stranger, his kindness notwithstanding. He opened the front door for her, but again she shook her head. "I will ride in the back," she said. He was now concerned but let her be. She climbed at the back, luggage still on her back, and sat that way for the rest of the journey.
Now you wonder why this woman would decline the offer, and you think she must have been a fool...
I was that woman, and sometimes you too may have been/are that woman.
We all have pasts, mistakes we have made, so grave you are embarrassed to even remember what you did. You look yourself in the mirror and wonder, why would I ever have done that? What was I thinking? Does everybody know? You feel disgusted by your image in the mirror. You wish that part of your life could be blotted out of your memory. How I have wished for this repeatedly!!!!! It is not possible though.
I remember very vividly the mistakes or sins I committed in the past that cost me a huge price... Quarrels with parents, lost friends, broken relationships, lost money, shame and dishonor... We all have those.
Ladies, you may have given yourself heart, mind and body to a man, thinking he was 'the one' and lost your dignity, confidence, or even self... Of course now you know he was not the one. You may not have ended there, but gone ahead to do the same thing with a different man thinking it is going to be different this time... Well, it was, probably the heartbreak was more painful... You may have terminated a pregnancy because the baby was "unwanted'...
Men, you may have gotten yourself involved in the wrong group and started robbing people on the streets, got a couple of guns, you did not mean to kill anyone, but somehow a bullet ended a life. You may have been the father to a baby whose life did not see the light of day because you denied the young confused pregnant girl, because you could not let her ruin your dreams with a child...
You may have been a teenager when you had your first sip of alcohol, tried all sorts of drugs, went to all forms of parties, in the name of seeking freedom and fitting in... (that age is confusing to the best of us anyway)
But now you are grown up, have some scars that mark the sort of life you lived there before, but somehow you do not feel whole again.
I was not born born again. I made the decision a couple of years back. By then, I had done so much that I should never have done, that I did not think God would care to listen to me. I battled with so much in my initial days in salvation, thinking and feeling that I was never worthy of forgiveness from God. Truth be told, HE had forgiven me the moment I asked Him to, but I had not let go of the guilt. Guilt is the enemy's weapon against your progress... Remember this famous photo?

We say as strong as a horse, yet this one was held prisoner by a mere  plastic chair. That is what guilt does.
(2 Corinthians 5: 17-19) Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!  All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
Do not live in guilt, for whoever the Son sets free is free indeed. (John 8: 36)
(Isaiah 1:18) Come now, and let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

I always ask people to make earnest prayers. Don't pretend before God. If you are battling with guilt and feelings of worthlessness, tell it to Him. Tell Him Lord, I did so much before I met You. I know You forgave me and now live in me. I still however feel guilty over what I did. Cleanse my heart and mind that I may see myself the way You see me.
(Romans 8: 1)Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus...
(Romans 5:1)Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
Let the Lord take away your guilt. That was the very purpose He offered you the ride. (1 Peter 5:7) Casting all your care upon him; for he cares for you.
Speak life and declare, "There is now no condemnation for me because I am in Christ Jesus. I have been justified through faith, and I have peace with God through my Lord, Jesus Christ"

All things will work together for your good.

Life sometimes knocks the breath out of you. Now you are standing tall, but in the blink of an eye, you are on the ground, in darkness, searching for a hand to hold you and probably lift you up, but it's too dark. You tearfully and fearfully grope in the darkness looking for the switch, all the while wondering who turned the lights off, and what really happened? You had been so happy, right?
Well, that is what happened to me. I felt like the mat had just been dragged out from under me, like all my foundations had been shaken. (Psalm 11:3) When the foundations are shaken, what shall the righteous do?
I terribly wanted to believe that the gut feeling I had was terribly wrong, that I was just being pessimistic, that I was only being negative, as so many of my friends had kept telling me. I had actually heard those statements quite often up to that time. Something within me had shuttered when I was told that he was admitted in hospital, and I felt convinced that actually he had passed on. Well, I needed to travel back home, three hours by road. Travel, I did.
I could think of nothing else, except that he was gone. Don't get me wrong, nobody had actually told me that he had passed on... It was these annoying, frightful thoughts that kept crossing my mind. He had been unwell, so I should have been prepared for this, yes? No, I wasn't. When I met my mother and she started speaking, trying to prepare me psychologically before breaking the news, I interrupted her with an, "Is he dead?" The words just stumbled out of my mouth. I couldn't handle the suspense. She let out a long sad sigh and said, "Yes, he passed on." I could not believe that he broke the promise. The last time we spoke before I left for school, I forced him to promise that he would not succumb to the failing organs. And he had promised! How could he? I did not cry. Instead I clicked, the now famous nkt! then proceeded to console my wailing younger sister.
I loved him, to bits. But I could not see past the broken promise. In fact I was angry. I wanted to see him and ask him a few questions on what promises are meant for.
That was the most difficult moment of my life. Losing the one man I had known for as long as I had known myself. He was my father, my friend, my confidante, my teammate. I called him dad.
Death has taken away so many people, so many things, and it leaves us broken, lost, confused, hurt, angry, worried, and sometimes poor.
It may come in so many ways, not the one that took away my father. It may be the death of your career, one you have worked for ages to build, and suddenly, someone goes behind your back and it is ruined.
It may be the death of a relationship. This in the form of a breakup or divorce, or even lost contact, probably due to distance.
It may be death of a human being. When a person suddenly loses all form of humanity and turns against you with no emotion, probably in physical, verbal or even sexual abuse.
It may also be loss of a loved one.
All these scenarios are different but they all leave us scarred. I know I was.
After my father's funeral, I thought I needed to go back to my normal life and move on. After all, they kept saying life wasn't over because he had left, right? I was a strong girl after all, or so I thought. I rested for one day and went back to school on the next. I went for class on the next, and I got very pitiful looks from my classmates, the walls I had built against my tears broke. I did not stay, but left for my room shortly after. That is where I stayed for the next month without leaving. I locked myself up, so if anyone came looking for me, they thought I was not in. I did not answer any calls except a few from my mum, when I 'felt like it'. I started thinking of painless ways to commit suicide. I had enough pain as was. I didn't notice I was on a downhill slope, until the day I started screaming and crying, mourning the loss of my father. That was when my recovery started.
I asked the Lord to help me because I could not heal from the pain on my own. This scripture came to mind (Romans 8:28) And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. That was the Word that pulled me through.
There are two things there:
i) loving God
ii)being called according to the Lord's purpose
I know you may have been knocked off your feet by circumstances so painful, you dare not speak them out, lest you lack enough words to express yourself, lest no one listens, lest no one cares, lest they that care fail to understand. But I have good news,(Proverbs 18:24) A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. This friend loves you, and has the power to turn even the most heartbreaking circumstance, the biggest blessing you ever received. Yes, even that which made you shake your head in doubt. Remember Hannah... Her barrenness brought forth one of the greatest prophets that lived. Remember David... His tending the flock and being the errand boy of the family turned him into a king... Remember Joseph, his being sold to slavery turned him into a prime minister.
You too, will amount to something my brother my sister. Trust the Lord to pull you through, and heal you.
Remember that the healing of an emotional wound, like a physical wound is a process. Go through the motions... Cry if you must, it is therapeutic. But never once feel sorry for yourself. Speak the pain out with someone whom you trust, but most of all, tell it to God. He listens and answers(Jeremiah 29:12). He is not a faraway sadistic God who enjoys watching His children living in misery. Rather, He is a loving, caring Father whose ears are always open to your cry, and arms open to receive you, hands ready to uphold you(Isaiah 41:10). Lean on Him and speak life.
Speak life and say, "Even this will work out together for my good" no matter how unbelievable it seems. Eventually it will come to be.