Verse of the Day 1/8

Through the Bible - Genesis 21-23, Matthew 8

 

Good morning,

What Wilberforce showed yesterday was love for others displayed over a lifetime.  It was unrelenting, I didn't give up, it didn't come and then go in a flash.  It was like the Energizer Bunny, it kept going and going and going.  John Piper described this as follows:

" I called that kind of persistent public love coronary Christianity rather than adrenaline Christianity. Adrenaline gives you energy for a moment and then lets you down. That's the way many people engage in a cause of love and justice. But the heart keeps beating as long as you live. That's what I meant by coronary Christianity; it persists in loving and serving and doing justice year after year after year. And I asked, Who of you will be the coronary Christians in the cause of racial harmony and the sanctity of life?"

The essence of this is found in today's verse which comes from the same passage as the "keep asking, seeking, and knocking" from yesterday.
 Matt 7:12 "Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.   NLT

It's often referred to as the "golden rule'.  Through the ages gold has been considered to be the most precious of metals.  This rule, if applied, if put on will prove, will show how precious it is to love in this manner.

 Piper continues, "There will always be challenges to love people different from ourselves—whether the differences are ethnic or in some other way. If Christ is your Lord and Savior and Treasure, and if God is your Father through Christ, and if you trust him to give you only what is good, then you will be growing (and helping your children grow) in the application of the Golden Rule to ethnic differences, as well as other differences."

 

We need to know God's Word and apply it, but that doesn't mean that we have to beat people over the head with it to "win them over" to convince them logically with theology.  I head John Maxwell once say at a Promise Keepers event, "people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care."  Showing that you care, treating others as you would like to be treated can open  the door to teaching God's Word. 

 

Read Ephesians 5:1-2 from The Message.  It encourages us to love "extravagantly".  All to often we find ourselves being too practical, too cautious.

Eph 5:1-2 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.    (from THE MESSAGE)

How might you love "extravigantly"?

Matt 7:12-13  "Here is a simple, rule-of-thumb guide for behavior: Ask yourself what you want people to do for you, then grab the initiative and do it for them. Add up God's Law and Prophets and this is what you get.   (from THE MESSAGE.)

Blessings,
Mike

mikevw@bellsouth.net
mikesvotd.blogspot.com

Matt 7:7-13

Keep Asking, Seeking, Knocking
(Luke 11:9-13)

7 "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.  8 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.  9 Or what man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone?  10 Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent?  11 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!  12 Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.   NKJV