So, what is love? Love is doing what is best for someone no matter how uncomfortable it may feel. It is not doing what we think will make another person happy. Are we willing to put our feelings aside to be sure someone else is not heading into trouble? Would we stand by and allow someone to run off a cliff without trying to warn them. Well, maybe a cliff is extreme...what about just hitting a tree? Would we rationalize it by saying, "Well who am I to say it is wrong to drive off a cliff" Then just go on about our day as if it did not happen and we were not responsible in any way? Our society has the keen ability to turn a blind eye and harden our hearts to what our true mission in life is.
We are called to Love...above all else. God says it is our highest calling. Do you know anyone who is running toward a metaphorical cliff. Warn them, don't just think someone else will. If God has made you aware, He wants you to step up like He stepped up for you.
I pray we all pick up our cross and follow after our Christ.
Candace
The Right Kind of Help
And I, if I am lifted up . . . will draw all peoples to Myself —John 12:32Very few of us have any understanding of the reason why Jesus Christ died. If sympathy is all that human beings need, then the Cross of Christ is an absurdity and there is absolutely no need for it. What the world needs is not "a little bit of love," but major surgery.
When you find yourself face to face with a person who is spiritually lost, remind yourself of Jesus Christ on the cross. If that person can get to God in any other way, then the Cross of Christ is unnecessary. If you think you are helping lost people with your sympathy and understanding, you are a traitor to Jesus Christ. You must have a right-standing relationship with Him yourself, and pour your life out in helping others in His way— not in a human way that ignores God. The theme of the world’s religion today is to serve in a pleasant, non-confrontational manner.
But our only priority must be to present Jesus Christ crucified— to lift Him up all the time (see 1 Corinthians 2:2 ). Every belief that is not firmly rooted in the Cross of Christ will lead people astray. If the worker himself believes in Jesus Christ and is trusting in the reality of redemption, his words will be compelling to others. What is extremely important is for the worker’s simple relationship with Jesus Christ to be strong and growing. His usefulness to God depends on that, and that alone.
The calling of a New Testament worker is to expose sin and to reveal Jesus Christ as Savior. Consequently, he cannot always be charming and friendly, but must be willing to be stern to accomplish major surgery. We are sent by God to lift up Jesus Christ, not to give wonderfully beautiful speeches. We must be willing to examine others as deeply as God has examined us. We must also be sharply intent on sensing those Scripture passages that will drive the truth home, and then not be afraid to apply them. - Oswald Chambers
I know someone who needed the right kind of help...It's me! I needed it a long time ago but looking back I see all the red flags, big and bright. It is still hard to not feel shame and guilt when I think of how big those flags were but God's always on time. He sees the end from the beginning, the whole picture. His plan is for our good and He's not finished with me yet.
ReplyDeleteIt helps us with being humble doesn't it? I can say the same thing about myself. You know how it is much easier to give an objective view point on someone else's situation? Could this be one of the main reasons God desires us to not judge others as well as leaving vengeance to Him? Looking back I can see where I felt my emotional decisions were just, but my view was askew. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
ReplyDeleteThis is one of the devotionals I did this morning, I think it is on topic with our comments. Hope you enjoy it! It is by Oswald Chambers - My Utmost for His Highest.
ReplyDeleteExperience or God’s Revealed Truth?
We have received . . . the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God —1 Corinthians 2:12
My experience is not what makes redemption real— redemption is reality. Redemption has no real meaning for me until it is worked out through my conscious life. When I am born again, the Spirit of God takes me beyond myself and my experiences, and identifies me with Jesus Christ. If I am left only with my personal experiences, I am left with something not produced by redemption. But experiences produced by redemption prove themselves by leading me beyond myself, to the point of no longer paying any attention to experiences as the basis of reality. Instead, I see that only the reality itself produced the experiences. My experiences are not worth anything unless they keep me at the Source of truth— Jesus Christ.
If you try to hold back the Holy Spirit within you, with the desire of producing more inner spiritual experiences, you will find that He will break the hold and take you again to the historic Christ. Never support an experience which does not have God as its Source and faith in God as its result. If you do, your experience is anti-Christian, no matter what visions or insights you may have had. Is Jesus Christ Lord of your experiences, or do you place your experiences above Him? Is any experience dearer to you than your Lord? You must allow Him to be Lord over you, and pay no attention to any experience over which He is not Lord. Then there will come a time when God will make you impatient with your own experience, and you can truthfully say, "I do not care what I experience— I am sure of Him!"
Be relentless and hard on yourself if you are in the habit of talking about the experiences you have had. Faith based on experience is not faith; faith based on God’s revealed truth is the only faith there is.