"Watch what God does, and then you
do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents.
Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a
life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious
but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us
but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that."
(Ephesians 5:1-2)
Growing up, everyone around me spent
time choosing the "perfect life verse." I struggled with
the concept. How does one choose just one verse that speaks for their
life? There are so many amazing verses, how could I possibly choose
only one? And so I didn't. Not for a long time.
But a few years ago, I came across
these verses. Now it wasn't the first time I'd read them. I had read
them many times before as I've read my way through the Bible a few
times in my life. It was this particular translation- The Message
translation- that spoke so loudly to me.
In these verses, Paul is calling us to
live as much like Jesus as we possibly can. He is urging us to
witness God's amazing love for his people and do our best to love
people that way too. Think about it. The same God who saved his
people time and time again throughout the old testament, the one who
rescued them from slavery in Egypt, who moved the Red Sea so his
people could cross, who gave them the Promised Land despite the
giants, who knocked down the walls of Jericho, who rescued his people
from complete annihilation in the book of Esther, and who sent his
only SON to die on the cross for us- for an imperfect, often
unappreciative, sin-filled people.
We were out on a hike yesterday walking
and talking as a family when the subject of organ donation came up. I
honestly admitted that there is no way I could donate an organ to
anyone unless they were a family member- and a close one at that.
Organ donation is tough. Recovery time is a LONG process. Sometimes
it takes as much as six months to return to full function with just
one or just part of any particular organ. As I walked through the
woods yesterday with my family, I couldn't picture making a sacrifice
like that for anyone unless they were someone I couldn't imagine
living my life without. Was I wrong to feel that way? Probably.
God is calling me to love others better
than that. And that is precisely WHY I've chosen this as my life
verse. I know loving others extravagantly and without caution is
something that I need to work on in my life. Claiming this as my life
verse is my way of reminding myself of what God is calling me to do
with my life- love others with abandon and without thought of how I
will benefit from doing so. He wants me to love people without
expectation. He wants me to demonstrate that love with some actual
action, not just words.
But how do I figure out how to do this?
Obviously I've lived the last 35 years and have yet to learn it in my
own opinion. What can I do to change that? These verse give us the
KEY to the answer:
"Keep company with him and learn a
life of love."
Those words are tucked right in there
in the very center, at the very heart. They are the key to making
this happen in our lives. If we want to learn how to live a life of
love, then we have to spend as much time with the teacher of this
love as possible. We can't learn it on our own- believe me, I've
tried. And I've failed.
But how do we spend time with him?
There are lots of ways and it isn't all centered around church. If
you ask me, church is the place we go to fellowship with others and
to practice the love that God is trying to teach us through service
to others.
Spending time with God happens wherever
you happen to be. Pray often. You may not hear his answer, but he is
listening. And he answers in so many ways. Sometimes he speaks to you
through others. Other times he will put an actual sign in front of
you or direct you to a verse or a passage in a book. He'll work
something out in your life that only he could do (like a friend
bringing you that coffee you desperately needed or a card coming in
the mail encouraging you just when you needed it most).
But the best way to hear from God is
right in his word. If you are not reading your Bible every day, you
are missing out on hearing from God in one of the most amazing ways.
Don't know where to start? Turn to John and start reading. Ask God to
guide your time together. Ask him to reveal what he wants you to
learn and to see. Don't read it with the thought of "how does
this apply to me?" Rather, read it with the prayer of "What
do you want me to know God?" They are similar thoughts with very
different directions. The first question makes Bible Study all about
you. The second makes it about knowing God better.
If you think about it, it makes sense.
Imagine a conversation with your best friend. She calls you crying,
telling you about her awful day. You'd never follow up her story with
the question, "And how does this apply to me?" You'd have a
fight on your hands and a broken-hearted friend. Instead, you'd
follow it up with words of encouragement. You'd know that this story
of her life is revealing something deeper about HER and her heart and
her life that you wouldn't know if you hadn't taken the time to
listen. It's one of those things that you can't learn on Facebook or
a passing conversation in the hallway at church. You can only know
the deepest things about your best friend through a constant,
effort-filled relationship with her.
That's what God wants with us too. The
Bible is FULL, stuffed to the brim, with stories that will show us
who he is, what he wants for us, what he longs to teach us, and
evidence of just how much he loves us. We can get to know the
character of God through the characters in HIS STORY.
My challenge to you today is this:
Spend some time with God today and read his words. What is he longing
to tell you? If you haven't yet, start looking for a life verse.
Choose one that challenges you to be the person that God is calling
you to be. Ask God to guide you to those verses, and he will. It
might not be today, but he will do it.
Be blessed today and don't forget to be
a blessing!
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