Read that verse a few times. It says when we know God's name, really know it way down deep, God's love will be in us. When we take the time to soak Him in, to let ourselves know Him in our hearts, minds and souls, we will love Him. Reading this verse, it looks to me that it is a given. it will happen if we meet God.
So, here was my thought: will this happen with people? If we have a problem with a certain person, would we lose that problem and actually learn to love that person if we really knew him or her? It is hard to get to know someone you don't want to know. But if we take the time, maybe we would at least appreciate that person or people knowing how much they are loved by God.
I am reading a book by Eugene H. Peterson called Under the Unpredictable Plant: An Exploration in Vocational Holiness.
It is written for pastors in particular but so much of it applies to everyone. There's one part in the book that fits here with what I have already shared that potentially will change your life. It has sure made me think. It is found on page 127 of the book.
"Over the course of years, most of the families in a pastor's congregation encounter illness or confinement or death of one kind or another. Since my Joycean conversion I no longer consider my visits at these times as the duties of pastor care but as occasions for original research on the stories being shaped in their lives by the living Christ. I go to these appointments with the same diligence and curiosity that I bring to a page of Isaiah's oracles, a tangled argument in St. Paul
"There is a text for this work in St. Mark's Gospel: 'He has risen . . . he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you.' In every visit, every meeting I attend, every appointment I keep, I have been anticipated. The risen Christ got there ahead of me. The risen Christ is in that room already. What is he doing? What is he saying? What is going on?"
What if you and I had this attitude toward all our encounters with others?