Monday, January 23, 2017 

Love God, Love People

 

Verse for the Week: Luke 10:27 (NIV); “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and, love your neighbor as yourself.”

Love God, Love People!

This commandment takes up very little space on the page but takes up all the oxygen in the room, challenges all the mental energy in my brain, and inspires every word of the Bible.

It is a phrase that is painted on walls, sits atop mantles in pretty frames, and written across the pages of heartfelt journals. It’s a mission statement at our church, part of our culture at work, and a highly held value in our home.

Its meaning is rich with power and depth—simple and yet extremely complex. Although this declaration rolls off the tongue with ease, it is most definitely one of the hardest commands to activate. Why?

Honestly, because it is just plain hard!

It’s hard to love God when the world around us is at war, our families are falling apart, or someone we love dies.

And then there are people. They can be really hard to love. They are unpredictable, self-centered, and can be devastatingly hurtful at times.

So, what is love? What does it mean to love? And how do we love when it is so hard to do so?

These are all poignant questions in need of answers. So, where do we begin?

We begin at the foot of the cross. God acted out His love for us by what He did on the Cross. That, my friend, is love. It’s a verb. It’s a concept. It’s a command. It’s a miracle. By this act of complete sacrifice, we experience His love.

Our experience doesn’t always translate as a feeling, although sometimes it does. Regardless, He died for us and that is love. And when we choose to believe it, we are changed. It makes us more forgiving because we’ve been forgiven and more loving because we know we are loved.

This command—Love God, Love People—is directional in nature. In order to appropriate love, we need to plug in vertically to God before applying it horizontally to others. This directional application is a picture of the cross. Let’s allow this visual expression of the cross to inspire us to go upward in order to go outward with our love.

Next time you are challenged to love someone—a family member, a neighbor, a friend, a co-worker, or even a stranger—resist the temptation to react out of the same old patterns. Instead, try focusing your heart, mind, attitudes, and feelings upward toward heaven.

Seek first the Lord and let Him love you. Let His love fill you and satisfy you, heal you and inspire you. In doing this we are then empowered to let our love flow outward to those who are hard to love. This is an act of obedience. An act of humility. The end result is a sweet aroma of love, the only kind of love we can produce because He first loved us!

Prayer:

Lord, I want to love. I want to love you and I want to love others. Show me how. Help me to see you and not the offenses that take me off track and cause me to turn my back on your command to love you and love others. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Hugs for a great week and remember, you are not alone. Be blessed, be loved, and love others!

Dori