We love because he first loved us. - 1 John 4:19

Dear Jesus, I love my parents because I realize how many great and wonderful sacrifices they made to love me and my siblings. Their love for me has produced love in me for them. It is the same with you. Not until I realized what great love you have given me by making me and putting me in your world, did I really have any feelings for you. And not until I realized the great sacrifice you made for my forgiveness and redemption did I have such strong feelings of attraction to your name. But I love you now more than ever. Help me to do the same for others by loving them first. Help me to produce love in them by NOT waiting for them to show any feelings for me before I reach out to touch their lives. And when they do notice that I have loved them with the kind of love that you have shown me, prevent me from exploiting that love and using it to manipulate them into liking me. Give me the ability to simply tell them about how it was really your love flowing through me all along. AMEN

Loving another person first, takes faith in God and faith in the power of his love.