Love

And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. (Colossians 3:14 NIV)

It's a new year! 2013: another 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days, 8,760 hours, 525,600 minutes, and 3,153,600 seconds of learning, progress, and new experiences.
(Well, now it's a little less cuz it's almost February!)
Anyways, with the new year always comes resolutions, gym memberships, and other cool stuff. I always write out new years resolutions at the beginning of every year, most the time I get super over ambitious and write out so many it's impossible to do them all.
This year my list consisted of reading a book a month (which would be a huge accomplishment for me), and then I'm gonna try to write a blog post per month....and I have several other personal goals with like my schoolwork and hobbies. That sorta stuff.
But this year my mom asked what fruit of the Spirit each of us kids wanted to 'resolve' to work on or focus on this year.
Galatians 5:22-25 says:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with it's passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep step with the Spirit.
So I got to thinkin bout it, and I could without a doubt use work in every area! But one that really stood out to me for this season in my life was love. It seems so simple, but loving people, God, and yourself can be super challenging (at least for me)! I feel like God's really pointing that out to me, because lately I've run into some people that I don't particularly like and even some people that have hurt my feelings in the past! And I've gotten myself to the point of honestly strongly disliking some of these people and wanting to hate them even! And when I get to feelin like this, I feel like God says, "Ashley, I made that person in My image, he/she is My favorite! He/She is My child!"
It sets me back a little and I think about all the times God has loved me when I have been the definition of unlovable!
If you read 1 Corinthians 13 it explains love super well..

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:1-13 NIV)

Love is like really important! I saw a little phrase on a missions newsletter I got in the mail that said, love has no borders.....I see how true that is in Corinthians. Love doesn't draw lines or build walls up.
In 1 John 4:8 it says that "....God is love."
And as Christians we are striving to be like our Heavenly Father in every aspect of our lives, so that means we must be love as well. That means loving our enemies and the unlovables. And even loving ourselves. Not in a selfish or proud way, but in coming to the realisation that God made us in His image exactly how He wanted us made and we have to accept ourselves and love ourselves if we're going to love and accept others.
This year and for the rest of my life I want to look like love, and love others for who they are and not for the reflection of myself that I see in them. I want God to saturate me with so much love that there will be no more place for hate.