Love Like Jesus

As I sit outside watching the rain pour down, and then drizzle, and then pour again, I can’t help but feel an overwhelming sense of peace. A calmness that touches the core of my being and lets me know that this is where I’m supposed to be. Coming to Costa Rica 3 weeks ago, I didn’t know what to expect. How was I going to communicate? How was I going to live? Those thoughts later came secondary to a question I should have been asking all along:

How was I going to love?

Being submerged into a country with a language barrier isn’t easy. You suddenly start to realize the small conversations you once had before are taken for granted. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to ask the stranger on the bus next to me how their day was. Or talk to the lady who’s sitting outside in the rain all alone. I asked myself, if I were in America, would I talk to these people? And sadly, I realized that normally probably wouldn’t. But being here, and not being able to have those small, meaningful conversations made me see how much we need those simple words to build relationships.

Fortunately, our group was so blessed to attend a language academy here for the past 3 weeks. I personally went from being really confused when people spoke Spanish to me to now only slightly confused. But seriously, all of us have learned so much over these past weeks and have grown leaps and bounds in many ways. Asking our host moms for a smaller breakfast has gotten easier. Talking to the cashiers from the supermercado has gotten easier. And building relationships became so much easier.

Once I surpassed those questions of how I was going to communicate and how I was going to live, I had to go to Jesus and discover how to love. Reading this you might say, “What? Loving is easy. How could you not possibly love someone?” But love is so much more than the superficial love word that we all throw around.

Knowing Jesus is knowing love and how to love because He is love. Really loving someone wholeheartedly means that no matter what they’ve done, no matter what they’ve said, no matter what they look like, the language they speak, the opinions they have, without any hesitation, you still love them anyway. Because that’s what Jesus did for us. He still loves us when we’re stubborn, when we don’t listen to him, when we grouchy, when we’re mean.

Jesus loves us all the time, which is how we should love others.

Intentionally loving like Jesus has become such a huge goal in my everyday life. It’s not an easy feat though because I’m human. Humans get mad, humans feelings get hurt, and humans are emotional beings who aren’t perfect. But we serve an awesome King who is perfect, and through Him we can learn to love.

Tomorrow, I will leave the beautiful, busy city of San José and head to the jungles of Shiroles where I will get to love more and more people and I couldn’t be more excited! So I’m asking for your prayers as my team and I begin the 6-week journey ahead of us. I’m so excited to see God move in each and every one of us and all the people we meet.

Check out the 3-Month Costa Rica IMMERSION program!

You must have a group size of at least 6 members to join this trip. Please view the Small Team trips or call our Servicing Department for more options at 888-475-6414.

View Small Team Trips

For most trips, you must have a group size of at least 6 members. Please view the Small Teams tab on each Community page or call our Servicing Department for more options at 888-475-6414.