It Starts Small

Love is a choice. Forgiveness is an action of love. You can not have one without the other. Today we look at the love and forgiveness of Corrie Ten Boom. As a Holocaust survivor, she showed unconditional love. She forgave those who had imprisoned and subjected her to horrific treatment. She had the courage to love and forgive her enemies.

Love is an attitude of the heart. It is choosing to love despite the faults, failures, hurts and hardships. It means standing by someone. This helps them navigate ups and downs in their life. This support is given in spite of their attitude or actions. Love is getting past hurtful words, actions, and behaviors.

Love is realizing we are all human. We will fail miserably in our lives. We are fallible. We are completely capable of hurting one another, letting each other down, and breaking each other’s heart.

Love is tested by time, patience, and endurance.

The Hiding Place is a memoir written by Corrie Ten Boom. She describes how her and her family hid Jews during the Nazi Holocaust during World War II. Her, her sister and entire family were arrested and sent to holocaust camps. Her sister and her were sent to a working women’s camp. She narrowly escaped death.

She considered her life a gift from God. She shared with the world the truth she and her sister learned from the experience:

SO I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness the world’s healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself.

A Hiding Place – Corrie Ten Boom

She truly grasped God’s never-ending love. She made it her life’s pursuit to travel the world. She taught others about God’s unconditional love and forgiveness.

Courageously love by exercising these principles:

• Determine to love in spite of circumstances, situations, or response from others.
• Take into consideration the difficulties, challenges, and internal battles others are facing.
• Set aside bitterness and unforgiveness and replace them with understanding, forgiveness and love.
• Search for ways to outwardly and intentionally love others.

Love is a never ending ability to see past the faults of others. God commands His followers to love in the same way He graciously loves us.

DO you truly grasp the God’s love for you?

Are you willing to share that love with others, even those who have offended and hurt you?

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