Walk into Love

Photo Credit: Alexandra Gonzales

We laid in bed listening to the song in silence when it ended I turned to my friend and asked, “What was your favorite part?”

“Walk into love.” she said so simply.

I had listened to this song about 1000 times and never once did I hear that part before. I sat stunned. What a bold line. Walk into love.

It had me thinking. What the heck does it even mean to walk into love? I wasn’t sure what it really meant but all I knew is the concept of walking into love kind of scared me. Well to put it simply, love scares me.

I remember the first time I “walked into love”. I was sixteen years old and I was asked on a date. The guy was charming and kind. A week after our date he asked me to be his girlfriend, of course I said yes. We dated for a while and with each day that went by I gave more and more of my heart to him. I trusted that he would love me. I thought I really walked right into love. After giving so much of myself to him he eventually just walked out of my life. After that he was dating another girl within a month. It was like I was nothing to him.

I made it a point from then on to walk out of love; to run from love as fast as I could. I put walls up around my heart, walls that would take years to come down. I was hurting, I was struggling, I was lost and I believed that no one could love me. Even if someone could love me there was no way in hell I was going to give them a chance, giving them a chance meant giving them the chance to hurt me.

This is how I have been living my life for the past 6 years. About three months ago I fell back into some struggles with mental health issues. I remember after a really rough day my friend looking straight at me and saying, “is it so hard for you to believe that you are loved?” The simple answer, yes it is nearly impossible for me to believe. I don’t let people love me so how could I be loved. I run from love.

Something had to change. I knew in this moment of silence as we sat on our beds that the line “walk into love” meant something total different than how I had been living my life.

Right after my friend and I listened to this song I decided I needed some quiet time. I walked to the downstairs chapel and breathed in the silence. I wave a peace flew over me as a slumped against the wall. I had just walked into the greatest of loves. I was met with the love of Christ alone. It was in this sweet moment that I knew I no longer needed to run from love, but rather needed to run to this love of The Father. This is what it meant to walk into love. Walk into love meant to fearlessly run to the father with open arms and to not only receive his love but to fearlessly give it to others.

Friends, walk into love. Believe in love. Love others. Know you are loved.

Walk into love is a lifestyle; it is a call to action.