The Best Advice

When I was a teenager, I visited a local nursing home from time to time.  

One day a good friend of mine went with me to the nursing home and a rude woman barked at her. I don't mean that figuratively. I mean she barked like a dog. And then she said, "You know why I'm barking at you? Because you look like a dog!" Nice. I guess that proves that not every cute old lady is sweet. 

However, there was this one woman I visited many times who had the kindest expression on her face. She was in a wheelchair and when I walked up to her she would take my hand and look at me so earnestly, often with tears in her eyes. She would repeat one sentence over and over again— the only sentence I ever heard her speak. She would say, "Love one another! Love one another! Love one another!" She said it like it was the most important message in the world, and I think it really was. 

I wonder what her life must have been like? No one's life is lived perfectly. It must have been full of good and bad decisions, happy and sad stories, victories and failures. I imagine she must have been convinced of God's love for her because her heart was clearly overflowing. Isn't that amazing? At the end of her life, when everything else had slipped from her mind, she still remembered, "love one another."