Category: Love

Forgiveness
28 Day Love Challenge · branch and fruit · Christian. · February · Love

Forgiveness

purposeunderheaven1 Comment

Let’s look at 1 Corinthians 13

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

A conviction hangs heavy on my heart.  The negative aspects of this statement regarding Agape love hits dead on.

It keeps no record of wrongs?  Love does not delight in evil.

In thinking about love, it becomes clear to me that before I can love others with Agape love I must learn to forgive.

Not superficial forgiveness–not just me saying it’s okay when you say you are sorry.  But the type of forgiveness that does not keep score.  The kind of forgiveness that does not plot subtle revenge.  And this forgiveness is not just for the big things that happen, but the resentments I have collected over time.  The ones where the perpetrator doesn’t even realize I am holding a grudge.

I must forgive people not just for harming me, but for hurting the ones I love.  That is a lot harder.  I must forgive them when they spread gossip and tell lies.  And when they do not stop others who are gossiping and lying.  I must forgive them when they verbally attack my friend.  I must forgive them when they act mean and cruel.  I must forgive them when they choose to turn a blind eye to what is wrong because they personally benefit.  I must forgive them when I feel like they only friend me when they want something.

My thoughts about how to get even are wrong.  When I believe I am fighting evil, but do not wish good for the person involved; then I am wrong.  Their evil does not make it okay for me to wish them harm.  I should not meet evil with evil.  But even more than that, everything on my list above could be said about me at some point.  My lack of forgiveness acts as a fertilizer to my unjust anger and the absence of love in my heart.

Look up forgiveness and an interesting lesson appears.  Jesus discusses forgiveness in Matthew 6 in the mist of his teachings on not making a show of your righteous acts.  Here is what he says:

Matthew 6

14 For if you forgive people their trespasses [their]reckless and willful sins, leaving them, letting them go, and giving up resentment], your heavenly Father will also forgive you.

15 But if you do not forgive others their trespasses [their reckless and willful sins, leaving them, letting them go, and giving up resentment], neither will your Father forgive you your trespasses.

God forgives us as we forgive others.  Can you imagine reaching heaven and having God point out every time you failed Him?  What if each time I fail HIm, the Lord said, “There you go again!  I knew your weren’t really sorry or you wouldn’t keep doing it.”  Or what if God, angry with me, plotted against me and not for me?

I want my sins to be forgiven and forgotten.  I want them to be as far as the East is from the West.  I don’t want them listed in the book of life.  I want them erased and forgotten.

So how do you forgive?  There seems to be two types of things here.

The small thoughtless slights.  The pain that comes from being forgotten or betrayed.  These I need to take to the Lord.  I need to follow Christ’s example and ask God to forgive those who hurt me.  I am more and more convinced you cannot wish harm for someone if you are asking God to intervene and to help.  So in these situations, I think you have to say to God “Forgive them they know not what they do”  Ask God to take the pain from you or to allow you to grow from the pain.  I don’t think this can be a general thing.  I think it has to be a very specific thing.  God I am feeling resentment against Joe and I ask you to forgive Joe for this sin and I ask you to forgive me for these feelings. Please take them from me.

The second type of harm is more deliberate and harmful.  People making up lies.  People gossiping.  People attacking someone who cannot defend themselves.  People stealing.  People breaking vows. People plotting to harm another.

Galatians 6
6 Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.

When we see a fellow Christian hurting others, we must take steps to restore them.  But it should only occur after prayer.  And before dealing with another person, be sure you have looked at your own life and dealt with similar sin.

Then you can approach the person who causing harm.   As you go to them, your first concern is for the people involved.  The person who is at fault and the person being harmed.

Today I am specifically asking God to forgive me for my unforgiveness.  I am praying for each resentment I hold and for each person I resent.  I am asking God to prune my tendency to hold grudges so I may learn to love in the spirit.

Love Challenge
Branch and fruit · Christian. · February · Love · Valentines · Vine · Vine

Love Challenge

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

In the flesh, I cannot love with Agape love.  This level of love is a self sacrificing concern for others in the small day to day and in the big lay your life down type of thing.
But this month of Love, I am Challenging myself to seek to be a person of Agape love.

In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul tells us that without Agape love our Christian walk is like loud clanging bang.  I take his words to mean that if we do not have this level of love everything else we do as Christians is worthless.  We are called to love.

1 Corinthians 13

New International Version (NIV)

13 If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

We are told in Galatians 5 that Agape love is a fruit of the Spirit.

Life by the Spirit

13 You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh rather, serve one another humbly in love. 14 For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 15 If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.

16 So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery;20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control.  Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.

 

So how does a person live by the Spirit?  This is what Jesus said in John 15.

John 15

New International Version (NIV)

The Vine and the Branches

15 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.14 You are my friends if you do what I command.15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit —fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.

Tomorrow, I start my February Challenge.  To walk in the Spirit.  To allow Christ to love others through me.  To be aware of those around me and to ask Jesus to create fruit from my branches even if it means God, the father, has to do some pruning.

Pray for me and if you are up for it, join me, as I ask God to create the fruit of Agape love in me (1 Corinthians 13) as described by Paul.

Opening a Mind
Ireland · Love · March · March 17 · St. Patrick · St. Patrick's Confession · St. Patty's Day

Opening a Mind

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

And there the Lord opened my mind to an awareness of my unbelief, in order that, even so late, I might remember my transgressions and turn with all my heart to the Lord my God, who had regard for my insignificance and pitied my youth and ignorance. And he watched over me before I knew him, and before I learned sense or even distinguished between good and evil, and he protected me, and consoled me as a father would his son.

One minute Patrick is walking in a field and the next invaders flood down on him.  They snatch him up with thousands of his friends and family.  Patrick ended up in a part of Ireland as a slave.

The change in his life caused a change in his awareness of God.  So often this happens with nonbelievers and believers alike. Trouble has a way of waking us up to our need for God.

The teen now a slave and alone.  The people captured with him having been dispersed across the lands.  Memories of Sunday services and maybe a grandfather’s sermon reminded him of the Lord who loved him.  Patrick says that in this experience he became aware of his unbelief.

Even as a Christian, I have been drawn back to God and drawn closer to the Lord through rough events.  Some times it is only through trials that we can learn to lean on God.  We learn what it means to actually trust Jesus.  It’s easy to say you believe when you don’t or to act like you trust when you never have.  Times of trouble provide an opportunity for each person to see if their faith is all talk or if it is real.  Looking back on my life almost all my growth in relationship with God has developed in the mist of trouble.

Patrick realized through this experience that he never had a personal faith in Jesus.  You can not become a Christian until you are capable of looking at your past and being honest.  This is where we find Patrick.  He acknowledges he has not been trusting Christ.  He admits his sinful ways.  He turns to God and trusts him for the salvation of his soul.  Jesus becomes Lord of his life.

Patrick as a slave became a slave to Christ.  He no longer was tied to sin but a servant of righteousness.

Roman6:18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.

 

Nothing will ever be the same for Patrick.

Day 23:Putting Christ First
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 23:Putting Christ First

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

Thought long and hard about walking with the Spirit; about being one with Chist.

5 “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. 6 If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. 7 If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will[ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. 8 By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.

From my birth as a Christian, the Holy Spirit has stayed with me.  But across my life there are times I am close to the Lord and there are times when He feels very far away.

The times when He felt far away, the Spirit had gone no where, but I typically had.  Those were the times when my prayer life grew less and less.  I stopped reading the bible.  I did not do any of this dileberately.  I just slid away.

At other times there would be something I wanted that I knew was wrong.  I convinced my self that God would understand.  Sure he wrote in the bible it was a sin, but it would make me happy and didn’t God want me happy.  I would ease into a life style I knew violated God’s will.  Justifying everything.

It’s not hard to find the times when I walked with the Spirit.  They almost always follow a time of straying.  My world starts falling apart.  Those God would want me happy activities start blowing up in my face and I am broken.  I don’t normally run back to Jesus as fast as I should, but I always run back.  A broken person, I fall on my knees and beg God to heal me spiritually.  I want back next to Him more than anything.

Those times when I can say I have walked with God.  Those days when I have heard the Spirit and know I am walking with Christ are the best periods of my life.  What they have in common are time of bible study, times of listening to sermons on the radio, but mostly, I spend time through the day asking God what I should do on the little things.  I listen for His voice.  I am in tune to His desire for my life and I try to follow his guidance.

These times of joy and closeness have actually occurred in times of quite in my life and in times of great stress.  The closeness comes from my putting Christ first.   My talking to Him through the day about all the issues, about all the problems and about all my choices.

If I am to love with Agape love, then I must be walking with the Spirit so that the Spirit can love through me.  I must not just have a quite time that I spend with Jesus (which I need big time), but I must be talking with God about everything through the day.  I must discuss the people who come into my life and ask for His guidance.  Or when my temper wants to flare, to ask him to calm me and direct me.

Day 22:Without Me ye Can Do Nothing.
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 22:Without Me ye Can Do Nothing.

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

As soon as I set my mind to do even one aspect of the many traits of Agape love, I fail.  I can’t do it. I fail even with my family who I hold the dearest of all.  Imagine how short my determination gets with people who don’t share DNA with me.

When I should be patient; I lose it.

My kindness leads to my resentment

Envy, pride and selfishness sneak into my day to day.  I only see them after I act.  But they are for sure a major part of my life

My temper flares and I promise you I am keeping a list of everything that others have done against me.

I try to “always” protect, trust, hope and persevere, but I fall short of always.

Can you imagine what a testimony we could be if we lived Agape love, but how?

I believe Jesus explained to us how this is to be done in John 14-16.

We can only love with Agape love if we are one with Jesus.  Not if we are believers.  Not if we go to church on Sunday or even say a prayer every evening before we go to bed.  We must be one with Jesus through the spirit.

John 15 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.

6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

8 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.

9 As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love.

10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.

11 These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.

12 This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.

13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

14 Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.

15 Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.

Paul also tells us that Agape is one of the fruit of the spirit.

Galatians 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,

23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

 So the question is how to walk in the Spirit.
Day 21:Stick To It
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 21:Stick To It

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

It is not enough to be patient and kind for a moment in time.  Or to have hope and confidence in others for a day.  You protection does not end when the enemy continues to attack and you grow so weary.  You must trust God and keep your faith in Him that those you love will find the truth and seek what is right.

We grow tired.  We try, but enough is enough right?  Its hard to love the person who constantly finds the wrong path, who seems to always want something from you and who treats you bad. When can you let go and just walk away?

Agape preservers.  Agape endures.  Agape hangs in there when others think you have given it a good try.

Aren’t you glad God preservers? He does not give up on us.

When we fail him, he picks us up.

When we come asking for Him for help, He is there for us.

When we ask for forgiveness, he forgives.

 

 

It is not hard to do all the things in the agape list once.  Or for those who appreciate our love.  But we are to follow God’s example and not give up on those who are sometimes hard to love.

 

 

Day 20:Investing Hope in Others
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 20:Investing Hope in Others

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

First bible verse I ever memorized.

Hebrews 11:1  Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.

Hope is the belief that a desire we have will happen. Or to wish for something with the expectation that it will occur.

Our hope for salvation in this life and the next rest in Jesus.

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life

I understand my hope in Christ; it provides my purpose in life.  I think about the lyrics to an old hymn when I think of the word hope.

My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.

But when we look at agape love; a characteristic of this type of love is hope.  Agape hopes always.  This is a hope not directed towards ourself, but a hope focused on others.

I started looking up quotes on hope and hopelessness.  The concept of hopelessness almost depresses you just thinking about the word.  People face moments of hopelessness during their lives, we are called to share our hope with others.  Not just the hope of salvation and heaven.  But we should share our hope in the day to day.

But I also think we are to hope for our fellow Christians, our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We desire good things in their life and we believe through Jesus these good things will come to them.  We share hope for the day to day.

Think about it.  Agape hopes all things.  We hope for others the good things of God.  We desire the rich life, the full life, the promises of Christ and we believe the Holy Spirit will provide them.  When you invest this level of care for another, it is hard to tear them down.  You build up those who you desire to see reach the heights of the Christian life.  You won’t sabatoge them, you will be patient with them because you trust they will succeed.

Hope directed towards others makes it difficult to not care.

Day 19: Agape Trusts, Believes, Has Confidence In
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 19: Agape Trusts, Believes, Has Confidence In

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

Let’s parse this one.  Agape trusts all.

I understand my love for Christ is a love which trusts Jesus in all things in all ways.  Why?  Because He has proven himself trust worthy to me.  I know that even when things seem strange and out of sorts that Jesus has it all under control and eventually it will work out for good.

Romans 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

Love requiring trust makes sense to me when it is us loving Jesus.  Why?  Because Jesus is trust worthy.

But turn it slightly, I know Jesus Agape me.  But I am not a trustworthy person at all.  I mean to be.  I really do.  I am like the disciples who kept falling asleep while Jesus prayed.  My spirit is willing but my flesh weak.

Matthew 28:40 And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could ye not watch with me one hour?

41 Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.

Why would Jesus have any trust in me?  I know He knows I will fail Him.  Yet Jesus loves me with agape love.  Jesus believes in me.  Jesus believes in you.  Jesus spoke about you and about me in his prayer.  He believed in us.  See His words.  He trusted us.

John 17:18 As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.

19 And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.

20 Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;

21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:

23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

24 Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world.

25 O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me.

26 And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.

We trust Jesus, that is the foundation of our relationship with Him.  We trust him for salvation and we are to trust Him through every stage of our lives.  We see He actually has faith in us that through our walk with Him we will grow towards the perfection of being one with Him and the Father.

But we are also called to have faith in our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We need to show them we have confidence in them.  We know if they hold on tight to Jesus he can do a great work in them.  When they are weak, we may have to help them hold on.  But Agape love trusts.  We are to believe in our fellow Christians just as Jesus believes in us.  They may fail us on occasion, but we are all in this growing process together.  Jesus believes in me even when the flesh is weak.

Day 18: Agape ___?____ All
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 18: Agape ___?____ All

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

In 1 Corinthians 13:7, the word translated beareth can also be translated cover, protect, keep secret, conceal, endure.

Thus our sentence could read

Agape beareth all. And we could make an argument that deep love endures the problems and issues of others.  You take onto yourself a portion of their burden.

Love protects all.  I think Agape love protects others from the evil of this world when possible.  You may have to allow someone you love to face the results of their decisions, but that also is a type of protection.  Allowing someone to learn in a safe environment so they do not have to learn in an unprotected environment.

Love covers all.  Think deck or roof.

My vision of this is a protective cover.  I see someone throwing themselves over a friend to protect them from harm.  It makes me think of Jesus’ comment during the triumphant entry into Jerusalem. 

Luke13: 34 

O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not!

Love endures all

Love endures the pain and the problems of others.  We suffer for another.  Think how much our Lord endured for us.

Hebrew 12: 2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

He endured the cross not for anything he had done but he took upon himself our sins and our punishment.  He endured it all out of love for us.

Day 17: Rejoice/Don’t Rejoice–An Example
28 Day Love Challenge · Christian. · February · Love

Day 17: Rejoice/Don’t Rejoice–An Example

purposeunderheavenLeave a comment

Luke 19:19 And Jesus entered and passed through Jericho.

2 And, behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was rich.

Zacchaeus represents our unrighteous one. As the chief tax collector Zacchaeus worked for the Romans to gather taxes.  His income came from the additional money he charged above the money actually owed to the Romans.We see he was rich.This implies he charged quite a bit above the required tax.

We should not rejoice in the sins of Zacchaeus, but what does that look like:

Luke 19:3 And he sought to see Jesus who he was; and could not for the press, because he was little of stature.

4 And he ran before, and climbed up into a sycomore tree to see him: for he was to pass that way.

5 And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house.

6 And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully.

7 And when they saw it, they all murmured, saying, That he was gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner.

Jesus tells Zacchaeus that he will dine with him.  We never see Jesus condoning the actions of the man, but we see him still caring and loving the man.

Then we see Zacchaeus moving to the truth.  He makes a commitment to change his life.  He seeks righteousness.

Luke 19:8 And Zacchaeus stood, and said unto the Lord: Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.

And Jesus rejoices in the man finding the righteousness and the truth.

9 And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house, forsomuch as he also is a son of Abraham.

10 For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.

But those in the crowd do not rejoice that a man who had been walking in unrighteousness might discover the truth if he speaks with Jesus.
Luke 19:7 And when they saw it, they all murmured, saying, That he was gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner.
They have no Agape love for this sinner.  They hold it agains Jesus for being with this man who is a sinner.  A common used phrase these days is “hate the sin and love the sinner”.  I think this is what is meant here.
While they are yet a sinner, we should love them like Jesus did.  And like he still does.