So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Mark 12:31
"The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself'. There is no other commandment greater than these"
Luke 6:35
But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for He is kind to the ungrateful and evil.
1
Corinthians 13:4-8
Love
is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant
or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or
resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the
truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,
endures all things.
Love never ends. As for
prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as
for knowledge, it will pass away.
All of these verses are great examples of love. Honestly, by God's Word, and by my own findings in life, I think that love is the greatest action we can do in God's kingdom, and to further glorify our Creator. 1 Corinthians 13:2 says "And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing."
This verse is saying we can have EVERYTHING we want, we could understand the bible thoroughly, rattle off verses after verses we have memorized, and have crazy amazing faith, but if we don't do this in love, then it has no purpose. We are speaking empty words, not practicing what we preach, and doing this is NOT how we should show others our Christianity!
When we go out into the world to preach the gospel, people aren't going to listen to our "great sermons" or "powerful speeches". That won't change their mind or hearts for that matter. They will watch to see how we love the world, love fellow Christians, and they will sense a radiance of love coming from our hearts and mouth. We need to make sure we love with our hearts, and the rest will fall in place. The words we speak, the thoughts we think, and the way we approach others.
1 John 4:8 tell us "Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.". That's pretty powerful!! We could study His Word daily, pray to him all we want, and if we don't love, we know nothing about God, because God IS love!! When Jesus came down to this earth to die for our sins, He did it out of love!! Not because we even came close to deserving that amazing sacrifice he made on the cross, but because He loves us, and rejoices in His children!! The best way to show others around us is love!!
Okay, so now we all know we basically NEED love to be a part of the kingdom of God... but how DO we love?1 Corinthians 13:4-8 has some REALLY good guideline on how we should love others!!
Love is patient and kind. How many times are we patient and kind when one of our siblings decide to spill water on your new dress? How are we patient and kind when our parents say "Not right now!" to something we really want? Being loving would be to have the right attitude, and realizing that it's okay that you have water on your dress, because what really matters is your love between you and your sibling, not a little accident, and that your parents know best for you when saying "Wait!" or "No!".
Love does not envy or boast. Okay... how many times have your seen your friend with those cute shoes that are just to DIE FOR??? Or you see someone with more friends than you? It's really easy to feel envious over an insignificant earthly object (such as shoes) or to look at someone with many friends, and to think that they have it all. In these situations, showing love to one another would be to truly care for them, and understand how you would feel in their situation. Feel happy for them!! Don't feel envious, realize that they're a person too, just trying to make it through life as well. It is the same for boasting. When you try to feel superior to other people by bragging or boasting, we are not truly loving them as Christ did. Apply Mark 12:31 in these situations (listed above).
I'm not going to go on about 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. You get the point. Try to think about the rest of the verse and apply it to your life. Love is such an important key in being a Christian!! I can't stress this enough in this post!!
Also, as a side note... I don't have everything perfect. I don't perfectly love others as I love myself. As typical human nature goes, I am selfish. It a constant battle to work and strive for, and this is exactly what I am trying to do when I write this blog post.
And remember "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," (Matthew 28:19)... And do it in LOVE!!!
~~Katie~~
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBvDiXCVkzwAnd here's a song about love that I really enjoy listening to by Kari Jobe.
I love Matthew 28:19... maybe possibly partly because whenever I read it I hear an eighteen-month-old Emmi reciting it from memory and it warms my heart :).
ReplyDeleteI loved your comments on not envying. It is so hard sometimes, isn't it? But the command to "rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep" is very clear that we can not have any room for caring more about our situation than helping them through theirs!
Blessings,
Bri :)