Love is patient and kind. I Cor 13:4
My Sisters dearly loved by the Lord,
Some lessons we learn quickly and others take a lifetime. I am being stretched this week as a caregiver to one who has been the continual source of hurt. Talking to a friend about what I expect in the near future she advised, "run, get out now!" Her response reflected the world's system of thinking. I have thought this through and know I am where I am meant to be because God is teaching me to 'love'. Love as Christ loved. He has called me to trust Him.
To love those who love us is not stretching. But God often calls us on to that which is hard, even impossible in our strength. That is when we learn to Love as God loves.
As I have loved you, so you must love one another. John 13:34
When my too frequent failure to love has confronted me again and driven me to my knees, in desperation I have cried out "Change me.... forgive me, love through me Lord, I cannot love ______!"
I rest in the Truth that the fruit of the Spirit is 'love' and the Spirit lives in me, as I count myself crucified with Christ I will experience His love for others. He will love the unlovely, the people in my life who are a source of pain or just plain annoying. I am learning to fully depend on Him for sanctification by faith. I recognize I am not overcome the 'flesh' in order to walk in the Spirit. I am to walk in the Spirit to overcome the the flesh.MS Hear this important truth. I am not to wait until I feel I have some mastery over the flesh; more confidence in my attempt to walk in the Spirit or that in the future i will do better than i have done in the past. It is just the opposite. Until i walk in total dependence on the Spirit i shall not overcome the flesh. I must count myself dead to sin... receiving this victory over my flesh by faith. It is a matter of receiving His Love for others.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us walk in the Spirit. Gal 5:22-25
The lessons of 'love' are always challenging because it requires dying to the flesh. Love is an action and an attitude. Love pleases Him. The world will tell you to consider your 'needs'. But are they not all temporal? Love is eternal. I have been helped by this statement from Joyce Meyers:
"You don't have to concentrate on getting your needs met. Just concentrate on doing what is right and God will meet your needs."
Trying to meet my own needs may be a temporal distraction but it does not satisfy. Our flesh will always try and avoid the cross, but we are called to daily take up our cross and follow. I long to lift Jesus name high by loving others. Not in words that sound so nice, but in deed that requires total dependence on Christ.
Giver of Life, Lover of the unlovely, where else would I go? I run to You. You are Life and Love and Hope. The lessons of Love you teach come through conflict and impossibility and You intend it to be so! Remind me the person I struggle to love is one for whom You died, one You love as You love me. Thank You my failure is redeemed by You for my good. Remind my sisters we are continually an object of Your love and Your plan for each of us is to transform us into the likeness of Your Son. Fill our hearts with a hunger to know such transforming love. May we be a conduit of Your love to our brothers and sisters; a living testimony to a lost world that You are alive and You are Love. Make us willing to pay the cost of loving. I pray in the Name of Jesus, who is Love, amen
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 1 John 3:16
az
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