LOVING ONE ANOTHER...IV

Forbear one another.

 

Let your gratitude for how often God has shown forbearance to you – loving you despite your many sins, mistakes, and weaknesses – motivate you to give other people the room to be who they are, despite all their imperfections. 

Remember that we’re all works in progress. Ask God to give you the humility, patience, grace, and humor you need to accept people without judging them, and to encourage them to be themselves around you. Keep in mind that, while Christians need to stand for essential beliefs such as Christ’s divinity, there’s plenty of room for different ways of expressing faith. Rather than trying to change people who bother you, pray for them and trust God to change them in the best ways and at the best times. 

Don’t deny people opportunities to serve simply because they have flaws. Accept and affirm the valuable contributions that imperfect people make through Christian service. Be willing to listen respectfully to people who don’t share your point of view on an issue, yet still share faith in Christ. Allow yourself to learn from their perspectives.

LOVING ONE ANOTHER...III

Be subject to one another.

 

Surrender yourself to God and ask Him to show you how to do His will in circumstances that are less than ideal. Instead of waiting for people and situations to conform to your wishes (which is futile), invite God to use difficult people and situations to transform you according to His wishes – into someone who’s more like Christ. Rather than insisting on pursuing your own agenda or protecting your own rights, trust God to do what’s best for you in challenging circumstances.

LOVING ONE ANOTHER...II

Welcome one another.

 

Be willing to embrace people as they really are, rather than as you wish they would be. Remember that God doesn’t play favorites; He generously loves all people, and hopes that you will, too. Don’t reserve your love only for those who love you back, or who are similar to you in personality, religious conviction, interests, background, social status, economic level, race, culture, etc. Ask God to help you accept all people as equally important because they’ve been made in His image. When you interact with people, acknowledge them, show appreciation for their accomplishments, express affection for them, and say something that blesses them. Look for the best in people and overlook the worst whenever you can.

LOVING ONE ANOTHER...I

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.

1 Corinthians 13:1-3 KJV

His extroverted personality annoys you. She seems too quiet. He favors a liturgical worship style, while you like a contemporary one. Her political views are too liberal for your conservative taste. Sound like any of the people at your church?

You may dislike them or disagree with them, but their commitment to Christ makes them your spiritual brothers and sisters. If you fail to reach out to them in love as Christ calls you to, then your broken relationships will do great harm to all involved. But if you take Christ’s command to love them seriously, that love will become a powerful force for good – both in your church, and your community.

 As we are commanded to love one another as followers of Jesus Christ, I want to share with you Whitney Hopler’s edited note on how to love one another from Gerald L. Sittser's book, Love One Another: Becoming the Church Jesus Longs For, (InterVarsity Press).

Remember what God intends the church to be.

 

The church should be a foretaste of what heaven will be like, with many vastly different people unified in their diversity by their love for Jesus Christ. It should be such a loving community that it’s an incarnation of Christ’s own sacrificial love. Realize that differences are normal and healthy; it’s simply how you respond that tests whether or not you’re willing to love. Keep God’s desire for the church to be a loving community in mind. Don’t settle for less, as far as it depends on you.

LOVING THE LOST - III

To Serve and to Save

I’m struck by the fact that Jesus talks about his ministry in two ways. 

In Luke 4:18, he says, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me.” He goes on to talk about preaching the good news to the poor and the captive.

In fact, this type of ministry was a sign that he was the Messiah. Prophecy was being fulfilled as he showed kindness to those who were hurting. Throughout Scripture we see the work of Christ among the widows, the blind, the broken—whoever had a need.

Jesus came to save.

In Luke 19:10 he says he came to seek and save the lost. And the same Jesus who came to serve and to save then says to us in John 20:21, “As the Father has sent me, I also send you.”

We have been sent by Jesus to join him in his mission. We are to serve others in his name, and we are to share the good news of salvation so that people might trust in Jesus’ work on the cross—his death in our place, for our sin.

Serving and saving were marks of Christ’s life on earth. They should be marks of his people as well. But to do that, we must engage the broken and hurting people around us.

That’s hard. But a church without the broken is a broken church.

How does your church engage the hurting? What have you done in your own life to avoid insulating yourself from brokenness around you?

Exerpts from Ed Stetzer's Article on Loving the lost.