Everybody Always... (A Book Review & Giveaway post.)

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Here's the thing... 
I love Bob Goff.

Well - I love him, and I hate dislike him... and here is why:

Both in reading his first book, Love Does, and in reading this second offering, Everybody Always, He points out the call to Love.  To, you know, be love.

Hello, tagline! Y'all know I love this. This is the same thing that God whispered to my heart years and years ago.  We are all, I believe, called to BE Love! 

In his newest book, Bob uses this language often. He uses the phrase "People who are becoming love..." and goes on to give examples of what they do or how they act.

The reason I struggle with Bob? It's this:
It's because he seems to actually DO it!

He actually puts into practice loving everybody always. 
Or at least that is his intention... on every day (...always.) 


Now, I don't know him personally although I've had the pleasure of meeting him in real life. (I actually wrote about that evening here!) 

But more than anyone else I know, it sure seems that he is nailing this becoming love and loving everyone all the time gig.

Which brings me back to why I hate dislike him. 

It's because it is one thing to talk about how we need to do this... to talk about how we are trying to be more intentional in giving grace and being love and, you know, being like Jesus and all that jazz.  

It's a completely different thing to be doing it!

Because now we know it's possible, right?

I mean --he's a real person, so clearly he's not Jesus and he 's not nailing it every time and he would be the first to point that out. However, he IS waking up each day and thinking about how he can be love to everyone around him... he IS doing it on purpose --not just on Sundays or on a Mission trip, but on Tuesdays and at the grocery store or in the airport or in his own neighborhood.

(Something about Love your neighbors...)

He is loving the people who are easy to love, of course! 

But he's also going all over the world and loving people who are hard to love... people who many may even say are not worthy of love. 

He's also loving the real people in his real life who are difficult to love. He's not playing it safe in who he surrounds himself with or how he loves.

I love him for this... and at the same time, Oh My Goodness, how this challenges me!  

I liked it better when I thought only Jesus could love like that! 

Like - sure, I should aspire to it but let's be honest, 
we're not Jesus, right?

Except this, from the book of Colossians:

"There is a divine mystery—a secret surprise that has been concealed from the world for generations, but now it’s being revealed, unfolded and manifested for every holy believer to experience. Living within you is the Christ who floods you with the expectation of glory! This mystery of Christ, embedded within us, becomes a heavenly treasure chest of hope filled with the riches of glory for his people, and God wants everyone to know it!

Christ is our message! We preach to awaken hearts and bring every person into the full understanding of truth. It has become my inspiration and passion in ministry to labor with a tireless intensity, with his power flowing through me, to present to every believer the revelation of being his perfect one in Jesus Christ." Col 1:26-29 The Passion Translation

Bob Goff lives like he knows this verse... as if he is aware of Christ living within him, flooding him with the expectation of glory!

I mean... come ON!!!

I want to live my life like that!

I had the honor of being on the book launch team for Everybody Always and I can tell you that reading through this book both inspired and convicted me.  It reminded me of truth... and it challenged me to live this truth out on a daily basis, on purpose --with purpose!

Will I nail it every time? Nope. Not even close.
I'm pretty sure I missed a few opportunities already today... but I'm leaning in and opening up and following Jesus and letting Him BE LOVE through me as I learn (through practice, trial and error!) to become Love!

Here are just a few of the things Bob has to say about people who are becoming love:

"People who are becoming love see the beauty in others even when their off-putting behavior makes for a pretty weird mask."

"People who are becoming love are with those who are hurting and help them get home."

 "People who are becoming love keep it real about who they are right now, while living in constant anticipation about who God's helping them become."

"We don't need to call everything we do 'ministry' anymore either. Just call it Tuesday. That's what people who are becoming love do."

"People who are turning into love don't need all the spin, because they aren't looking for applause or validation from others any longer. They've experienced giving away God's love as its own reward. They also don't need to write 'Jesus' as the return address of every loving thing they've done. People who are turning into love give their love away freely without any thought about who gets credit for it."

"...people who turn into love don't keep track anymore. They don't memorize the good or bad they or anyone else have done. They memorize grace instead. Jesus didn't do any of the relational math either. He just became Love, and the world's never been the same. The promise of love nad grace in our lives is this: Our worst day isn't bad enough, and our best day isn't good enough. We're invited because we're loved, not because we earned it."

"We spend a lot of time doing recitals in our faith communities than I think Jesus had in mind. Stages, audiences, and platform changes us. People who are becoming love don't need any of it. It's not inherently bad to have all the stages, but we can end up playing to the wrong audience."

"People who are becoming love understand God guides us into uncomfortable places because He knows most of us are too afraid to seek them out ourselves. It happens to me all the time, and I usually only recognize in hindsight that the hard place I've navigated helped me to steer a more purposeful course forward. This has been God's idea for us all along."   

And this is only a few of the underlined and highlighted portions of the first half of the book!

In the world right now, there is a lot of chaos and stormy seas and skies. There is plenty to focus on that is wrong or scary or seemingly unstable and unsure. There is. No one is denying this. 

There are a lot of people who are hard to love... who we don't want to love... who we want to have to earn grace and love... but we also know that on any given day, we can be one of 'them' ourselves!

Bob challenges and inspires us to wake up each day and make a game plan to love everybody always.  

Make love your plan!

"Here's the thing: we usually don't need all the plans we make. Sure, plans can help from time to time, but planning to love people is different than just loving people. For some people, it's easier to make plans than to make time. If this is you, here's how to fix it: make love your plan. There's less to write down that way." (Everybody Always, pg 96)

See? He makes it seem so easy peasy.

In this book, he reminds us that it is. 
It is easy peasy. 
We just follow Jesus and do what He did! 

What did He do, you ask? 
  Well, He loved
    EVERYBODY ALWAYS!



Enter to win a copy of Everybody Always by Bob Goff here:
a Rafflecopter giveaway

GIVEAWAY OPEN TO U.S. RESIDENTS ONLY!

I'm also linking up with the lovely writer communities linked below:

Kelly Balarie for #RaRaLinkUp

Lori Schumaker for #MomentsofHope

Jennifer Dukes Lee for #TellHisStory

I'd love to hear in the comments below
who is someone who challenges you
and inspires you to let Love win?