Love is our highest calling as believers. It is the Great Commandment given to us by Jesus himself.
Yet love can get messy. Love can get hard. Love can get misconstrued.
I read a quote today from Rick Warren that sums up my feelings on love. Rick says,
"Our culture has accepted two huge lies. The first is that if you disagree with someone's lifestyle, you must fear or hate them. The second is that to love someone means you agree with everything they believe or do. Both are nonsense. You don't have to compromise convictions to be compassionate."
In response to the racial unrest in our country, the global pandemic, and the overall negativity we see in politics and social media, I felt called to write a song with a very simple message…love. To say I was obsessed is an understatement! In fact, I have never felt more urgency and prompting from the Holy Spirit in my life….EVER! I went to sleep thinking about it and woke up in the morning thinking about it.
I asked Rachel to write the song with me, and we ended up writing a song called “Choose Love.” God kept putting on my heart that it needed to be more than just a song, and we needed to produce a video to go along with it highlighting the positive things happening around us. This could be a powerful tool to combat all the darkness.
Because of God, this song has grown from a simple song to a movement in my local community. Our Mayor will be issuing a proclamation on Monday declaring it Choose Love in Siouxland week, and the song and video will be released on that day. Laura and I have developed ways our community can Choose Love throughout the week, and we will end the week with an outdoor community event on Friday night.
The response of the community has been overwhelmingly positive! God has blown doors wide open!
Yet I go into this knowing it has the potential to get very messy. I know people might try to immerse their own agenda into it. I know some people won’t agree with it. I know some people will tell us this is too simple of an answer, our problems go much deeper than love.
If I’m honest, I’m nervous about many things. This has been a huge undertaking, and we’ve put things together very quickly. What if politics and negativity get drug into it? What will I say to the media that are covering this when they ask hard questions? I’m reminded of the message I gave at the Choose Conferences about choosing faith over fear that were held before the pandemic hit! Ha!
Truth is, Jesus faced the same kind of messiness and opposition. The Pharisees and Sadducees constantly attacked His teaching. In Matthew we read:
Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Matthew 22:34-40 (NIV)
Powerful words from our Savior! Love is always the right thing to do, and it always makes a difference!
Would you join Choose Conference in our efforts to spread the word to Choose Love? We really need your prayers surrounding this.
Our Mayor is going to challenge other cities to join us, so we have the potential for this song and movement to reach a very broad audience. Please pray for protection for Rachel, Laura and I as we navigate through unchartered territory.
Please pray that the message stays pure and strong.
Please pray against the enemy getting into any piece of this song, video and movement.
Please join us in praying that love sweeps over our nation like a tidal wave, destroying the hate and darkness in its path!
And most of all, join us and CHOOSE LOVE!
Hugs and love,
Jill