Greetings! Happy Fresh Start!

I hope that you have been well or are aspiring to be. I decided to wait to greet you, officially, because the new year is always bursting at the seams with plans, ideas, resolutions and stress. Now that things are settling, I wanted to share with you the first in a series on vitamin deficiencies. First, though, I wanted to have a bit of quiet time with you.

While pondering the importance of 2016, I decided to actually study the number, 16, I found a most important connector: it is love. There are 16 things that show what love is and is not. Let’s look at them:

Love suffers long (patient) and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never fails. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 New King James Version (NKJV)

Many of us have heard these quite often. Sometimes, however, the words resonate with new clarity. Listen: the greatest accomplishment that we can attain this year is love! Love for God and for man. Everything else revolves around love. Think of it: you have been angry with that person for so long. It takes so much energy to maintain anger and unforgiveness. Let it go. You say it is more easily said than done. Here are two things to consider: 1. We’re not so great, ourselves, yet God has forgiven us; 2. Nursing hurt, anger, and forgiveness hurts you more, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Consider the following:

Excess of Certain Emotions Affects Particular Organs

Anger affects the Liver, Stomach

Fear affects the Kidneys

Grief (Anxiety) affects the Lungs, Large Intestine (Colon)

Pensiveness affects the Spleen

Joy, of course, affects the heart. Make this the new beginning of loving without reservation. Your heart (and other organs) will thank you.