Can we really affect the world? With a busy life, can we have a positive impact on a community? Is it possible to impart the fragrance of Love where ever we go? Why not try stopping for the one and see?

When the children were younger, I regularly drove past my daughter’s school on my way home from dropping off my son. As I did, I often prayed for the school, the teachers, those in authority, the children, the school community at large.

One morning, I was praying as I drove, when the principal of the junior school came to mind.

As I drove closer, I suddenly felt the Father’s heart. It was His Joy Indescribable. With the feeling came a flashback to earlier that morning. I had seen the same person throw her arms wide with a great, joy-filled love as she leant down to hug a small girl at the school gate.

With the flooding Joy and the flash of memory, I knew I needed to stop at the school on my way home. I KNEW I needed to run into the school, and give this person a hug (a big hug) and tell her how loved SHE was.

When I saw the hug on the street, I had smiled to myself. She was tangibly pouring out love. I knew I had to do the same for her. Indeed, I had felt the desire to run across the road and hug her earlier that morning. Perhaps I had missed His first prompt!

I pulled over in the autumn sunshine and ran into the school, past a staff member. I called out as I ran,

‘I’m here to give Miss M a hug.’

On seeing my target, I declared,

‘I need to give you a hug!’

She stood straight up, stepped over her papers and with arms open wide, she let me hug her.

‘You are so loved! You are doing a great job! I saw you hugging the girls this morning, loving on them, and now God wants me to give YOU a hug!’

Now, please note. Hugging is not my thing. Touch is not my love language. But when God tells me to hug, I hug. It’s taken time to know to obey this prompt, regardless of my discomfort. I also understand that if I respond in faith, I will often benefit too because, as He pours Himself through, over and around me, I am also touched and saturated in His Love.

And so, I stood there with this teacher and we hugged.

Honestly, this hug was amazing. I genuinely love this person. I feel safe around her, to be fully me. The joy and love I feel for her is not just Heaven sent, it is genuinely me as well. So it was His love and joy for her, but mine as well. The hug was equally a blessing to me as it was to her!

With the hug finished, she stood back.

‘Oh, that was good. You’re a good hugger. I felt that! Look, I’m covered in goose bumps!’

I smiled.

She knew who the goosebumps were from.

‘He just wanted you to know how very loved you are. He wants you to know that you’re doing a great job.’

As I went to leave, I called out,

‘Have a great day!’

As I left, I walked past the first staff member I had seen on my sprint into the school. With an overwhelming desire to hug her as well, I offered.

‘I’m always up for a hug,’ she responded, and she ran over and threw her arms around me.

Mid hug she said,

‘Oh, you ARE a good hugger!’

I gave her a kiss on the cheek as the principal called out,

‘It’s a wonderful hug! I’ve got goose bumps all over me, up and down my legs.’

I called out that I loved it, too. A hose that allows water to flow freely gets wet with water as the water passes through. So too the love of God. As I release Him, I receive His love too! And His love is GOOD! His love is SOOOO GOOD!

I left, running into the sunshine, feeling Him flowing all around and through me.

It was a Joy Indescribable.

As I drove home, still basking is His love, I realised I could smell both their perfumes on my coat.

I smiled, realising that I had also left a deposit of perfume on them too. It was the fragrance of Love. I knew that, like me with their perfume on my coat, they would carry His fragrance throughout the day. Their interaction with Heaven would affect others they came into contact with, for His Love is an infectious love. God imbued us all with His fragrance of Love as we had stood and hugged each other.

One of them had called, as I ran out the door, ‘I needed that’ and I can honestly say, ‘I needed it too!’

Like a person whose perfume lingers on your clothes long after they have left, we can leave the fragrance of Love in our wake.

For we are to God the sweet aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing.

2 Corinthians 2:15

We always receive a blessing as we release God’s goodness. Regardless of the form or shape that His love takes, we are more blessed than those who receive! When we will stop on our way and release His Goodness, His Kindness, in the way HE desires, we get saturated by Him, too. These words describe it to a tee, and those words simply put are…

God IS Good!

 

Note: This story follows a couple of years of stepping out and praying for individuals at this school. After months of stopping and encouraging the principal, and others on her staff, she had an open door policy for me to enter her office. When we choose to engage our hearts, inclining our ear towards God’s promptings throughout our day, we release the fragrance of Heaven. This has an accumulative effect, which often creates favor for us to release Kingdom concepts, ideas, and blueprints into a community. With our obedience comes apostolic impact, and so the Kingdom of Heaven advances. It is His LOVE that causes hearts to shift and change. With a change of thinking, community change follows. If we roll this concept out on a macro level, this is how we can change a nation in a day.

For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

Habakkuk 2:14

© Beth Kennedy 2023

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