“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.  This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear Friends, since God so loved us, we ought to love one another. No one has ever see God: but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”  1 John 4: 7-12 NIV

Sitting in a parenting small group at church as a mother of a struggling teen, wanting to scream as the others shared prom pictures. Pictures of a normal life … pictures that stabbed me in the heart and reinforced my insecurities as a single mother.

Do you speak my language?

Welcomed into a small group, until the label Single Mom was attached to me and the marrieds in the group starting acting differently. Like my goal was to steal away husbands, obvious unspoken boundaries were put into place; who could sit by me, hugs exchanged for handshakes, and conversations would no longer be held one-on-one.

Do you speak my language?

A church single’s group, an open discussion about the Bible’s reference to adultery after a divorce.  Found by some to be more Sinful than any other sin.  A hypothetical scarlet letter appliquéd to my shirt.

Do you speak my language?

Like the little bird seeking its mother in the Dr. Seuss book, “Are You My Mother?”, I sought someone to speak my language. The one I understood from birth as a mother’s love nurtured.  The language I hear in the stillness. The language He and I share. The language of love.

Foreign languages and memorization are difficult for me. My brain works differently and I have learned an alternative way of memorization in visually recalling an image. I have also learned to communicate in another language with hand signs and pictures. These aren’t weaknesses; they just allow me the opportunity to look at a different way of doing something.

As God’s people, I challenge you to look to speak someone’s language in a different manner. Seek out the opportunity to relate and not segregate. Look at different ways to show love to the proverbial struggling single mother. Love as God loves; unconditionally. Because God’s unconditional love changed everything for you.

Father, Let us reflect Your unconditional love when our love becomes conditional. Let us recognize divine appointments to show Your love in our daily lives and help us to be obedient to Your prompting.