How Do YOU Love?

We, the body of Christ, are to share the love of God with others.  If you are a Christian, it’s your job.  Really, it IS your job.  It’s my job too.  And it is the job of everyone who bears the name Christ.  Why?  Because we live in a world where people are lonely, hurting, disappointed, disenfranchised, and hopeless.  If we aren’t willing to extend love, who is going to do it? 

In Matthew 22:37-40 when asked which the greatest commandment, Jesus is replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”   Whoa Nellie!  (Yes, I did grow up watching Bozo, the clown.) That is major!  Of course we all claim to love God, but I don’t see a whole lot of people chasing their neighbors down to love on them.   

1 John 4:20-21 says, “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.”  Hmmm.  Now, it’s not Barbara saying that, it’s Bible!  And I didn’t see any exceptions given, which means that we are called to love the ‘unlovely’, those who may not look like us, act like us, believe like us, vote like us, smell like us and in some cases may not even like us.  None of that matters.  What matters is that we are obedient to the job given to us, the job to love.  

According to 1 Corinthians 13, “if you have not love, you are nothing”.    Again, very serious.  So, how does one love like that?  Well, we have all read the formula in the same chapter.  But have you ever applied it to yourself?  Read out loud the excerpts from verses 4 -7 below.  Instead of the word ‘love’ there is a blank.  As you read, fill the blanks with your name. 

____________ never gives up
____________ cares more for others than for self
____________ doesn’t want what ____________ doesn’t have
____________ doesn’t strut, doesn’t have a swelled head,
____________ doesn’t force self on others,
____________ isn’t always “me first”
____________ doesn’t fly off the handle
____________ doesn’t keep score of the sins of others
____________ doesn’t revel when others grovel
____________ takes pleasure in the flowering of truth
____________ puts up with anything
____________ trusts God always
____________ always looks for the best
____________ never looks back, but keeps going to the end

Wasn’t that a good description of you?  That is the YOU that will fulfill the commandment to love.  Let me encourage you to speak those words regularly, so that they nestle deeply in your spirit.  Hide these words in your heart so that they define who you are, but more than that, they will define how you love.