What are you talking about? "Love." Oh, thanks.
Why is it that the people that are "closest" to us are often the hardest to love?
Do you think that's true? If you can't love those closest to you, can you really love people you don't know well?
To fully love someone, we need to really know them.
Right now, evaluate your relationships with those that are closest to you. What do those relationships look like?
Mark 12:28-31
Translation (NLT)
The Most Important Commandment
28One of the teachers of religious law was standing there listening to the discussion. He realized that Jesus had answered well, so he asked, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"
29Jesus replied, "The most important commandment is this: `Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is the one and only Lord. 30And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.'[a] 31The second is equally important: `Love your neighbor as yourself.'[b] No other commandment is greater than these."
We are called to be a people who love each other. Period.
1 John 4:20-21
If someone says, "I love God," but hates a Christian brother or sister,[a] that person is a liar; for if we don't love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we have not seen? 21And God himself has commanded that we must love not only him but our Christian brothers and sisters, too.
If you want to be spiritual, love those that are hardest for you to love.
1 Corinthians 13
(NLT)
1 If I could speak in any language in heaven or on earth[a] but didn't love others, I would only be making meaningless noise like a loud gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I knew all the mysteries of the future and knew everything about everything, but didn't love others, what good would I be? And if I had the gift of faith so that I could speak to a mountain and make it move, without love I would be no good to anybody. 3If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;[b] but if I didn't love others, I would be of no value whatsoever.
4Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5or rude. Love does not demand its own way. Love is not irritable, and it keeps no record of when it has been wronged. 6It is never glad about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8Love will last forever, but prophecy and speaking in unknown languages[c] and special knowledge will all disappear. 9Now we know only a little, and even the gift of prophecy reveals little! 10But when the end comes, these special gifts will all disappear.
11It's like this: When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child does. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12Now we see things imperfectly as in a poor mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.[d] All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God knows me now.
13There are three things that will endure--faith, hope, and love--and the greatest of these is love.
How do you go beyond saying "I love people" and become a person who authentically loves the people in your network?
Is it really love if you have to decide to do it?
2 comments:
So can we really love strangers? If loving someone is committing ourselves to them, how does that work with some dude on the street? Are there other aspects to love that would be more appropriate in those situations? Is it a lesser type of love?
if love is defined in 1 corinthians 13 - then you can apply that to every person on the planet. now, you probably won't ever have a chance to show everyone on the planet love - but everyone you come in contact with can experience love from you. i am not saying they would identify your contact with them as love, but you can still be loving them.
the main point that i want to present is that we often equate our ability to love with the people that are easiest for us to love, instead of the people that are more difficult.
i think we all need to grow in our ability to be loving people - not with strangers, but with the very people that challenge us in this area.
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