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Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Faith

"But now faith, hope love, abide these three, but the greatest of these is love." 1Corinthians 13:13. What I would like to do is to still continue with our series of love but at the same time address this last sentence of the love chapter if you will. This sentence talks about 3 characteristics that are to mark/manifest us as Christians. The first is faith. What is faith? This is a hard concept to get our hands on. It is something that is believed, It is a belief and trust and loyalty to someone. The first thing that one needs to understand that one faith starts within the mind/thinking process. Let's face it we are very easily swayed to thinking and trusting varies things. We here it on t.v. and trust that it is true..and we believe it... we put our faith in it... and sometimes later on we find out that it wasn't true... but we still do the same over and over. So let us call this faith on man; for we can come up with many way we trust man and lift them up. But there is a component of faith that needs to be talked about. That is what about putting your faith in someone you cannot see. Putting your faith in someone you only heard about or read about? Remember faith is in the mind thinking. Can one put his faith in someone he cannot see? Yes, for that is part of the meaning of faith. If we start thinking in the way we have learned... without being open to things which are beyond what we can see or that we know, then part of faith is missing. Let us call this part of faith, believing. We come to the reality of God is real/true and His son is Jesus.. this is believing. Now there is another component of faith, that would be to trust. Now what do we trust? We trust the one we believe(put our faith in) would be who he said He is and do the things that He says He can do. Here is the thing with us as Christians, is that we start to expect God to do things that we want... going beyond the things that He said He will do. And sometimes we challenge God to do things for us, putting Him to the test if you will. Things like this is what causes ones faith to waiver if you will. So faith is a believing and trusting, and if you want more faith you need to believe God more and trust Him more!

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Love endures and never fails

Love endures all things. If you have noticed when we have been talking about all things we have been putting the all things in perspective of using the term love; not allowing ourselves to get carried away if you will by some things that may not involve love. So love endures! If we look at the word endure we think of being able to with stand a force... not giving in. That love would be victor over hardship, suffering, people abusing... It is not that love will break down all that is bad... even though it will in the future. It is that love will get us through all these things that are in the world. Many times in my life I have tried to get through situation... and yes some if not most needed me to give love or extend love. Here is what I have found that by myself a lot of times I would fail in giving love... that roots of bitterness and... would still be there. That by myself it was not truly in me to extend the love that need to be extended. I needed help and the help I needed was from Jesus the Son of God. Without the power of God it is hard to truly love when we are in the state of enduring. It is hard to give love and it is also hard to receive love. Love never fails. You see when we show love, unselfish true love it has power... It has an effect on people... sometimes you may not see it... and sometimes it takes a long time to do it's work... but love is very power. If you keep reading down in bible 1Corinthians 13 it talks about us having power to do things... Love is not about having special powers... it is about doing good, doing righteousness, restoring, comforting... being in tune with God if you will to love like He loves. God so loved us He sent His Son, Jesus. Jesus so loved us that He did not deviate... from the task before Him of going to the cross to redeem us. You see the love of God never fails, it endures all things. That is the love we all need.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Love believes all things Love hopes all things

Love believes all things. This is a hard concept to get our hands upon! So what I want to do is to give a simple quote of my wife, which she learned from her mother. "Look for the good in people." It is so easy to look at the negatives of people... But if we can get beyond that negative... and see some good... then we will be able to love them... and even be more willing to share the Gospel with them... and hopefully see the good God has bundled in them... So with that we will go to the next what love is; love hopes all things. So let us look at hope; hope is an expectation of something to happen, it is a desire with anticipation... So when we put this hope with all things; it is that we have a hope no matter what is going. We have hope as Christians of eternal life; even a mist of great trials... Also we have hope that all might be saved! There is hope for everyone! So we should have a love for them and hopefully they might become believers in our Lord Jesus.

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Love bears all things

Now there are two different translations of this the first Love bears all things the second, Love covers a multitude of sins. Love bears all things. Another way to say this maybe that love puts up with a lot. For believe it or not we do a lot of stupid things, we do a lot of injurious things unknowing and sometimes knowingly, we neglect one another, we hurt one another... Love can overcome all the hurts... Now that is, true love, that is tapped in to our Lord Jesus Christ. Love is a strong power if you will, and yes love can do amazing things Love covers all things. Now this will put things more pointed if you will. For a reference in the New Testament would be 1Peter 4:8"Above all keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins." Love does cover sins, now that is true love if you will. For our sin is not only covered by Jesus shedding His blood on the cross; for His action of going to the cross is out of His great love He has for us. So for us we need to understand how to have great love for others. Can I be serious with you all? I have been a Christian for a long time; and in all my years I have not felt or had to suffer such pain and _____... as in the so called Church. Gossip, jealousy, back stabbing, dislike...even while doing good/ good deeds... not to say that I am perfect... Now with that as I go on with this study of love I understand how hard it is to love ones that are Brethren that do things of injury. Here's the deal it seems that the ones who are doing these things are so called 'The spiritual of the Church' . Not knowing about how to be a shepherd, how to truly love... For us we need to overcome their actions of hurt... and to show love... we need to forgive them... Now here is the hard part; how does one trust those who have ____ you? I have heard a lot about forgiveness and trust... it is hard to trust those again that have hurt you. Let us be real it is hard real hard. Not only that it is hard to get close to them again, seriously think about it! You see gossip, dislike, jealousy, with hurts are hard to overcome, they rip deep inside. In fact those are things that destroy relationships, people and even Churches. For us the only way we can overcome is with our Lord Jesus Christ. He can help us to forgive... and to love and He can overcome the hurts... and heal the relationships. He can restore! One more thing is that we will not be the one who is the cause of these great hurts... Guard your selves!