My Job is to Love

By Beth Fontana

Honestly, this has been a tough couple of weeks. I have been seeing girls who keep re-offending. Each one goes back into the same environment and life becomes hopeless. How do I share the hope of Christ with these girls who are in hopeless situations? I have heard these precious young women say the following:

• “I feel like I am going to be in prison for the rest of my life.”
• “There are times I wish I were dead, so I don’t have to be in so much pain.”
• “I want to do better, but I find myself doing the same thing over and over again.”
• “I really do love God and want to live for Him.”
• “I don’t know how to change, but I want to.”
• “I don’t want to die!”
• “I continue to go back to what I am used to and think that is love.”
• “Drugs have a grip on me.”
• “My family will no longer have anything to do with me.”

I have reflected a lot this week and today about what God has called me to do. These young women have taught me so much about God’s love and how He works. We are all broken, but we are broken in different ways. So I can’t keep putting God in a box. I no longer believe that the way He works in me is the way He will work in these girls. So how do I serve these incredible young women?

I have to trust that it is God that changes hearts and works in each of us differently. These young women suffer in a way I will never understand, so their transformation will look different. As Billy Graham said, “It is the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, God’s job to judge and my job to love.” However, it is the Great Love of God that has penetrated my heart, so I can love and learn to love as Christ loves me. “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us!” This is the love that is our hope!