A friend of mine wrote the following meditation, and I was so touched by it because I have been trying to see myself lately as a loved child of God … as a flower in the hand of the creator … instead of as a person with all these illnesses and conditions.

He writes:

Dare to love… 

Dare to love those who see you as the special angel you are to them.
Dare to love those who wait for your next breath, your next smile.
Dare to love those who see the perfect you inside the imperfect reality.
Dare to love those who care what happens in the next moment of your life
Dare to love those who God shows you and those to whom you were shown
Dare to love those who know you and love you anyway as well as those who love you and know you anyway
Each soul you touch is a person who loves you, even if they don’t act that way. Maybe it’s fear or boundaries or rules or lost hope that keeps them from showing love. But fear can’t chain the heart. Only a curtain can cover it but rest assured it’s there for you, always.
Dare to love … dare to love.

Spiritual author Henri Nouwen articulates the same message in his reflection, “Accept Your Identity as a Child of God”:

Your true identity is as a child of God. This is the identity you have to accept. Once you have claimed it and settled in it, you can live in a world that gives you much joy as well as pain. You can receive the praise as well as the blame that comes to you as an opportunity for strengthening your basic identity, because the identity that makes you free is anchored beyond all human praise and blame. You belong to God, and it is as a child of God that you are sent into the world.

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