Many of us have spent years trying to love God and others and have found ourselves running on empty — reaching for patience, generosity, or compassion that just isn't there. This sermon suggests we may have been starting from the wrong place. Rather than treating love as something we are supposed to produce, 1 John 4 points us toward a different starting point: love begins with God, not with us. We love because God loved us first. This opening sermon in the "This Is Us" series invites the congregation to understand Hudson First's mission not as a standard to achieve, but as a response to something that has already been given — and to find in that truth both rest and a fresh sense of purpose.