A few years ago my family started doing “Love Better Circles” inspired by Matthew 22:37-39.
And He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
The practice was a way to intentionally love God, our family, our neighbors, and our world more and better. We would sit down and write down ideas for how to love better that week. Sometimes it would be hard to think of things and other times it would be easy, but the more we did it the better we got at it. Back then I wrote a blog post explaining it further that you can see here along with posts about each category here.
That was deep in the Covid era when we were at home a lot. Things have gotten busier now, we’re deeper into school now, we’re sometimes less intentional with what we do with our kids now. So, it was time to bring it back. We’ve done it for three weeks now with our 6 and 4 year old, and sometimes my in-laws who live with us. I can tell my kids aren’t used to it yet. They usually have to be guided to ideas for each category, but I have hope that they will soon love the practice and easily come up with their own ideas.
As long as we remember to do it! To help make it a habit we’ve started a Sabbath practice on Friday night of reading this prayer, lighting an electric candle (my kids MUST take turns with this or there is a huge fight!), writing our “Love Better Circles” for the week in a notebook, and reading one question from 801 Questions Kids ask about God with answers from the Bible. We also have a notebook in the box to record anything that we are thankful for that week if anyone brings anything up.
It’s important to put God first, to love others, to ask questions, to remember the amazing things God has done in our lives. I pray that this habit of valuing these things continues in our family and in the hearts of our children. It doesn’t come without struggles and distractions. If we go out for dinner on Friday night this all doesn’t happen until the next day or the next week. Our kids are easily distracted by the pull of their toys or the delight of being silly with their brother. Doing the box during dinner helps because they are focused on eating. I have hope that the more we do it the more it will be ingrained into the schedule of our lives.
Once after school I asked my kids if they were able to show anyone love that day and M said there had not been an opportunity. I pray that he begins to see more and more ways to love and that no action is too small to be considered a way of loving better. May Jesus be our guide and our companion on this journey of loving better.
