Love one another
I haven't had much to say lately. Mostly that is because I've been wrapped up with these tests. Trying to get out when I can. Enjoying the occasional bobcat sighting. (God is good)But I think I need to say something.
By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments. The one who says "I have come to known Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a liar and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked. - 1 John 2:3-6
We are love, because He first loved us. If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also. - 1 John 4:19-21
I remember that when I became a Christian, the practical side of me took a while to get out and explore the new landscape. And when it did, it was terrified by what it saw.
Apparently, I had to love. Now, at the time, this seemed ludicrous. I wasn't loving, and I didn't think I had to be as long as I was right. Wasn't truth of ultimate importance? After being starved of it by the church I was attending at the time, it was the truth or nothing at all. And if you didn't get the truth, if you didn't understand it, well, you're an ignorant beast who deserves your sorry destination. In fact, I knew of a great church for you to attend if that didn't matter to you.
Seriously.
To me, "love" smacked of hippy-Kum-By-Ah-ism, where we all hold hands and forget that there is a right and a wrong way to think about things. Oh, but I was wrong and it was only by the gentle prodding of the Holy Spirit who patiently softened my heart to the fact that even the most chafing individuals in my life were to be treated with the same love and care as the most precious and endearing individuals God had put in my path. The hardest obstacle wasn't loving the members of the Body, but loving those who were not regenerated at all, those who I may interact with daily.
May I ask you this: Are you there? Can you think of the most chafing individual you know, and can you put yourself in their place for a day and treat them as if they were you yourself?
posted by Marcian @ 6:14 PM
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