Pastor's Reflection for the day

Love is an emotion that we all seek to give and receive, especially when experienced as a happy and fulfilling gift from God. The love we find easiest to share with another person is love that affirms our existence and fills us with joy and visions of sunrises and flowers. However, when Jesus asks Peter three times, "Do you love me?" he is pointing us to another kind of love. After passing through the cross and into the resurrection, Jesus invited us to look beyond our pleasurable human love to see if we are committed to the kind of love that nourished him as he suffered the pain and betrayal of the world. God is already aware of the level of commitment and capacity of our love, so the question Jesus asks us is really only intended to invite us to examine our own heart, and our own ability to comprehend and participate in the unconditional love of God for humankind.