The Life of the Beloved

Author: Amy Zullo
October 20, 2022
Beloved Children of God, let us worship the Lord.  As I hear these words each Sunday at the beginning of worship, I am reminded of God’s unconditional love. 
I read a lot, but one of my favorite books is Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World by Henri Nouwen.  Nouwen wrote the book in response to a friend’s suggestion that he write a book about spirituality for people in secularized society. This friend found the book too religious for his secular vision of the world, but Nouwen went ahead with publication of the book in 1994. The book has touched thousands of readers and continues to be one of Nouwen’s best-selling books with its insight that we are all the beloved children of God and that we can live our lives trusting in this truth of our identity.  It is a short book, written in simple to understand language, but has profoundly affected my life. 
I first read this book almost 25 years ago and have re-read it multiple times since then.  I remember when I first read it how much I needed to hear and accept this compassionate and tender message, “all I want to say to you is “You are the Beloved,” and all I hope is that you can hear these words as spoken to you with all the tenderness and force that love can hold.  My only desire is to make these words reverberate in every corner of your being – “You are the Beloved.”  It was a difficult time in my life, a time when I was feeling broken and unlovable.  I needed his message then and I still need to be reminded of that acceptance today.  I am a Beloved Child of God; all of us are Beloved Children of God. 
Nouwen challenges us not only to claim that we are the Beloved but also that we must become the Beloved.  “Becoming the Beloved means letting the truth of our Belovedness become enfleshed in everything we think, say, or do.”  Using the words from the Last Supper which state that Jesus took the bread, blessed it, broke it and gave it to his disciples, Nouwen explores how we are taken (or chosen) and blessed by God, how we are broken, and how we are given to the world.  The book is comforting and challenging. We are human and imperfect, but God loves all of us and calls us to show that love to the world.  I hope you can hear these words; I hope they reverberate in every corner of your being as they resonate with me, YOU ARE THE BELOVED. 
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