What Is Love?

In 1 Corinthians 13, the Apostle Paul says that there is only one stat that ultimately matters in your walk with God - one thing that that truly tells the world who you are, and that is your love (or lack thereof). The real question is, how do I grow in love? What does love look like? What does love do, and what does it not do? What is love?

2. Love Is Jesus-y

When I picture Paul writing 1 Corinthians 13 and describing love, I picture him writing down that first word, “Love is patient” and then struggling to come up with the next thing to say… “Okay, love is patient… it’s… it’s… hmm… how should I say this? Love is patient, it’s… it’s…”



Now, I don’t know if I’m right about that, but the reason I always picture it that way is because of the second word Paul used to describe love. And look, It’s not that I think he was struggling because he didn’t know how to describe love, but because his mind was literally exploding with so many things and so many ways and words to describe love! There was so much he wanted to include and the thing that came into his mind next was a word that is completely and totally amazing.



“Love is kind.”



That word that we have translated ‘kind’ is a Greek word that is almost exactly like the Greek word, ‘Christ.’ In fact, (and don’t miss this) most guys who study the Bible and the Greek language feel that this is a word that was invented because of Jesus and His life. Here’s what I mean… When people watched Jesus live His life, He loved in a way that no one ever had. He loved outcasts, strangers, foreigners, little kids, enemies of the state and even His own betrayers! Jesus was kind to people when He was exhausted and overwhelmed. He was kind when everyone else wanted to turn folks away and be mean. He was tender to the broken and He was gentle with those wearied by their own sin. He was willing to be a servant when He had the right to be the boss. There was literally never anyone like Jesus, ever. No one loved like He did. No one was kind like Him. He was so loving and so kind, that it seems like folks literally started using a new word to describe it.



That is the word Paul uses to say that love is kind. It’s a word that looks and sounds almost exactly like the word ‘Christ.’ It’s like Paul is saying, “Love is patient… it’s… it’s… how should I say this? Umm, love is patient, and… well, it’s just all Jesus-y. That’s it! Love is Jesus-y. Love acts like Jesus did.”



Here’s the big question though: If love means to act like Jesus did, then how in the world am I supposed to pull that off?! I mean, Jesus was kind like that because, well, He’s Jesus… and I’m not! — Well, that is an awesome question. I guess the thing we need to figure out is this: How did Jesus love the way He did?



One of the most amazing examples of the kindness of Jesus was on His last night before the cross when He washed His disciples’ feet. Washing feet was slave labor, literally. Jesus was and is Almighty God and the King of the universe. He didn’t have to wash the nasty feet of those guys who were arguing about who was the best and would soon betray Him, but He did it anyway. He got down on the level of a slave and served them… Wow. And here’s the really cool thing: Right before He did that, John says this about Jesus: “Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God.”



You see that? Jesus knew two things: He knew who He was and He knew where He was going. The same is true for you, right now. You know you are a child of God. You know you have been forgiven an eternal debt of wrong. You know God adores you right now as you are and always will. You know that as soon as this life ends, you’re going to heaven forever to be with the God who loves you. If you know who you are and where you’re going, you can love like Jesus loved. Knowing who you are and where you’re going frees you up to get rid of selfishness and just love people. If you know who you are and where you’re going, you can be Jesus-y. There are people in your life who are almost impossible to love, but they are longing for someone to love them. In the deepest part of their heart, they’re wondering if anyone could - or would be like Jesus to them. That person is you.

Source: LeeYounger

Others May — You Cannot.

Others May — You Cannot.
by G.D Watson

"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live;
yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I
live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." - Galatians 2:20

Others can brag on themselves, and their work, on their success, on their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.

The Lord will let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hid away in obscurity because He wants to produce some choice fragrant fruit for His glory, which can be produced only in the shade.

Others will be allowed to succeed in making money, but it is likely God will keep you poor because he wants you to have something far better than gold and that is a helpless dependence on Him; that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by day - out of an unseen treasury.

God will let others be great, but He will keep you small. He will let others do a great work for Him and get credit for it, but He will make you work and toil on without knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more precious, He will let others get the credit for the work you have done, and this will make your reward ten times greater when He comes.

The Holy Spirit will put strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and will rebuke you for little words and feelings, or for wasting your time, which other Christians never seem distressed over.

So make up your mind that God is an infinite Sovereign, and has a right to do what He pleases with His own, and He will not explain to you a thousand things which may puzzle your reason in His dealing with you. He will wrap you up in a jealous love, and let other people say and do many things that you cannot do or say.

Settle it forever, that you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that others are not dealt with.

Now, when you are so possessed with the Living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this particular personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, you will have found the vestibule of heaven.

I know the Devil delights when I feel left out by God. I know he rejoices when I question God and His ways and seeds of doubt are readily planted. And when I feel like I have been pushed to one side by God, cheated out of my inheritance, and so, so, so, alone - trumpets of victory are blown in the darkness.

He is the father of lies. Of guilt, doubts, worthlessness. Deceit, pride, envy. And I know he roams my life, looking for areas where his demons can set to work, where he can begin to creep in unnoticed and start to destroy. His tools are doubts, delighting in overwhelming worthlessness, inciting fear and rejection; how heavy are his chains of guilt and bondage! And what victory he gains when we do not fight back, self-controlled and alert against the wiles of him who prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for one to devour! He laughs when we are blind and stupid, not realising that he must flee when we stand firm.

The father of worthless idols knows the Father of All that is Good, and even his demons know that there is one God - and they tremble! The god of this world knows that the God of the Universe has good plans for my life - and so he tries to steal. Steal away my faith, my trust, my confidence in His justice. So he tries to kill - my hope in the Lord, that He is faithful to all His promises, loving towards all He has made. And he tries to destroy - all my efforts done for the Lord, making them seem worthless and futile, and as if God had forgotten me.

But the Devil will get no victory in this life of mine.. I stand on His Word. That I am born of God, overcoming this world, not living of it. That He who is loving and faithful gives what is needed to His creatures at the proper time, in His time, and satisfies the desires of every living thing. That I am arranged in this part of the body right where He wants me to be - I cannot be an eye and desire to be an ear, or say that I am not part of the body because I do not have the same role as the feet, or say to the neck that I do not need it. Because if we were all an ear, where would the sense in that be? And if we were all one part, where would the body be? For the body is made up of many parts - but it is one with Christ as it's life.

And He tells me that those parts of the body which seem to be weaker are in fact, indispensable... And the parts which are unseen, thought as less honourable, we treat with special honour.

The Lord does not see things as man sees,
He looks beyond the outward appearances
and into the heart.


(2 Peter 5:8, James 2:19, John 10:10, Psalm 145:13-16, 1 Corinthians 12:12-27, 1 Samuel 16:7)

Of crumbling pages and well-worn spines

Have you ever read words describing colours like wild vermillion, robin's egg blue, alizarin crimson, gold ochre, and deep cobalt; and you strain to imagine it, knowing that the colours of a vibrant soul would be exactly that? Have you ever been swept away by a whirlwind of emotions, pushed back and forth between tides of alphabets and punctuation, rolled the taste of certain phrases in your mouth because it somehow fits exactly?

Because only a good book can give you that sort of dull, aching feeling in your heart for a place that does not exist - a longing desperation for a city, town, country that no one has seen, much less felt or heard. A good book will transport you into it's dusty roads, bustling markets, scents of sandalwood and lavender and pine. Noises of bargaining shopkeepers, laughing villagers, haggling wives, the clopping of hooves swimming around your head.. Breathe in the scent of woodlands and sweet air and ancient bookshops, and get lost in a reality far, far away. Each word precious and beautiful, a writer knows which word will tug at your heartstrings and chooses with care the words to use, as delicately as a master tailor handles the finest silk. He will pull you into pools of letters that threaten to drown you and crash over you like the most ferocious of waves - and words will pull you along it's current, powerful, relentless, consuming. And at the end of every last page, he will leave you breathless. Eyes shining brightly, mind a whirlwind of newfound places and friends and adventures. That is the beauty of a good book.. It will leave you with a longing for places unseen and a desire, a hunger for more. An ache in your heart the way a lover runs her hands through familiar cloth belonging to a once-lover long gone. Time dulls but the musty familiarity doesn't fade. A book lover will never, ever be satisfied. There will always be more places and cultures and melancholy sighs of characters yet to be discovered - Always.

... And so if you have never felt those things, never shed tears over a character writen off as dead in it's story, grieved with the grieving characters in a book, cried with a character as well as for him, had your soul dance along as they danced, laughed along with their inside jokes and taken deep shivering breaths as the biting winter chill goes deep into their bones - if you have never felt sorrow, like you have just lost a good friend when a book comes to the end of it's story - then, no. No, you have never... Loved a book.

Genesis 22, The Grief of a Father

Hearing the words that stunned him. Rendered him speechless. Wondering. Confusion. Numbness. The words that broke his heart.

Had he heard the Lord rightly? The Lord he knew as just and faithful? The Lord who had made for him many great promises, a God who did not lie? ... A burnt offering?

Stunned. His son. His one and only son. But his Lord was good, his Lord was faithful. His Lord is. He would make a way - He had to. ... Wouldn't he?

Grief. Shock. Numbness. Packing the tools. Walking up the mountain. His son, his only son.. But for the Lord, anything. He would restore. He would heal. He had known and heard too many times His holiness and glorious voice. ... Hadn't he?

Obedience. Faith. Belief. Those words faltered and swam around his mind. Not fully taking place - only a blind trusting. A trembling heart full of grief. His son, his only son! Sacrifice. Offering. Death. Lapsed promises. But for the Lord.. Anything.

Father, where is the lamb for the burnt offering?

Oh, how his heart broke! How his lips quivered, his knuckles white against the walking stick he was leaning on. Tears forming like shining pearls at the corners of his eyes. Where is the sacrifice?

No, my son. God Himself will provide the lamb.

And so they walked. Silence.

The place on the mountain reached. The birds flew past in the air, strangely silent. A stagnant wind. The time had come.

... Father, why do you do this? Why, father - Why?

His heart could not shatter more than it already had. His son, the son whom he loved! Turning aside his head for the moment of darkness. Arm raised above his beloved. Glittering, deadly, death.

But

Abraham. Abraham. Stop.

A voice from Heaven. Lifting his tear stained face - hope was glimmering like dawn breaking over the waters. Faithfulness Himself had come. Hope had arrived. Deliverance was here.

---

I believe that Abraham truly felt a deep grief when he was told by God to sacrifice his son whom he loved, Isaac, as a burnt offering. I believe that Abraham had questions. Tears, hesitations, a broken heart. But the Bible did not record down what Abraham felt - the Bible recorded down what Abraham did. Abraham chose obedience and actions. Walking up that mountain, I don't think he was singing songs of praise to God. But I do believe Abraham trusted the Lord that had given him favour and blessings throughout his life, believing that He knew what He was doing. In the end, his son was saved and the Lord gave an amazing promise that Abraham's descendants would be as numerous as the stars in the sky and the sand on the shore.

---

How was the grief of God the Father as He watched His one and only Son walking the distance to His death on the cross? The pain of Abraham multiplied - no way out for this but for a real suffering and a real pain. The nails. The cry from His Son's lips - Father, Father, why have you forsaken me? He shut His eyes, turned away His face, a heaving grief, but altogether knowing this was the only way. The only way... And they said darkness covered the earth. And the veil into the Holy of Holies was torn. And - But wait. Listen - an echoing resonance throughout heaven -

"Father forgive them... For they know not what they do."

Finished. It is finished.

Grace in Times of Need

Let me ask you a question: When does God give us "grace"? Oh, I know, every act of God is full of grace. But specifically . . .

"Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need." (Hebrews 4:16)

Answer: "in time of need." In trials, tribulation, distress, wilderness experiences, illness, suffering . . . whatever defines your unique "time of need."

Now, ponder this:

"Be careful that none of you fails to respond to the grace of God, for if he does there can spring up in him a bitter spirit which can poison the lives of many others." (Hebrews 12:15, Phillips)

* * *

Lord, I'm hurting. I am in a time of need. I want people to encourage me, to understand, to hurt with me. But I certainly don't want to use this time of pain to play on the emotions of others, seeking to get my needs met by clinging to the burden instead of responding to Your grace. I agree. There is extreme danger in becoming bitter when people do not meet my expectations, or becoming bitter when the pain doesn't seem to subside. Help me to be discerning, Lord. The desire of my heart is to walk in the provision that You have given me . . .

Your amazing, immeasurable grace.

Lifetime daily devotions, day 102