Love God

Through trusting the Church to teach us the Word of God, we have attributed holiness and reverence to those in leadership positions, in place of God, Himself. His plans and His rules were interpreted for us from these sources, and they lead us in our faith. They pray with us and worship with us, and from this respect in their position, they recognize their own glory. Paul openly recognized his apostleship and the boasting that he had rights to because of this title. [1] We must, likewise, follow his example and put our desire to please Him first and envelop ourselves in His purpose to better show our love. He requires time and money of us as part of our sacrifice and dedication, especially of those who call themselves pastors and teachers.
God would rather have our loyalty and obedience than the sacrifice of worldly possessions or the additional doctrines adherence to doctrinal trends [2]. Our dedication to His word and our personal communication to Him through prayer connects us deeper to Him. Love for God is explained in the works of Christ [3]. He loves us knowing our worst secrets [4], before we ever had opportunity to succeed [5]. In each of these verses, He comes to us a loving Father, who loved us before we knew Him, before we gave our lives to Him.l Without loving him, taking his name upon us, doing the works associated with being a Christian, becomes chores instead of natural habits. This attitude will lead to bitterness and anger when we lose sight of His plan for us. We are trained to think we haven’t done enough works to merit his blessings. We often come to him with repentance, rather than praises and honoring of His works. As an example of this, my family, having lost a grandparent, was told that praying more and following the Church’s teachings would have saved her. Our love and reverence for the Father comes from the love and sacrifice he gave to us, when we deserved it the least. His love is infinite, accepting us exactly as we are, as he knew before we came to be. Nothing about God’s love is based on your loyalty or sacrifices for any man’s ministry, everything comes from Christ’s ministry living out through us.

Love Others

When God asks us to love others and help them through tough times, we tend to only think in big moments. We plan mission trips, food drives, helping the impoverished, and such because, that’s what we just know Churches do. All of that helps, it all makes a world of difference in many lives. But how often do we see an opportunity to help someone and we let it pass by because it might make us uncomfortable, or is not exactly our problem to fix, or, really, just distrusting the recipient’s intentions? We are called to be cups overflowing with His love and help to fellow Christians and those who do not know his love. We are to work daily so that we may support ourselves and help others, thereby earning the respect of those outside our faith [6]. God is not asking us to put ourselves into a bind or to worry about where the gifts will go once they leave our hands, rather he is challenging us. He asks us to take some of what we’ve already been blessed with and do the most good with it that we can personally. He has promised to provide for us and bless us until we overflow, if only we will share his love and blessings with others. [7] At times, it can feel that we are helping those who would not help themselves, that they have brought the misfortune on themselves, or that maybe they are bad people. However, becoming a positive impact on those around us, in our day to day lives, can come in small quantities. Sometimes, buying someone’s lunch or listening to them or helping them through tough times can be the light in their day to bring us all closer together as part of God’s children. We have the power to change the lives of those around us simply through love and generosity. Individually we strive to be the Gospel of God’s love to everyone around us. “Warn those who are idle and disruptive, encourage the disheartened, help the weak, be patient with everyone… always strive to do what is good for each other and everyone else.” [8]

Love You

We are precious to God, from the moment of our creation before we live out our first day on Earth [9]. Throughout the bible we see example after example of God loving us as individual people, caring about the smallest details and letting us know the image he has for us. He has crafted us day by day into His plan, counting hairs on our heads, making us like jewels in his hands, to show us how incredible His love for us is, singing our very praises [10], [11], [12], [13],[14]. All of these come together to show us one truth: God loves us, as He made us. Christ has perfected us according to His plan[15], watching us grow in our faith to know him more fully. Sin made us unworthy of the perfect sacrifice, but God sent perfection, his holy and perfect son to save us, to atone for our impurities because He loves us[16]. Love yourself, and from the healing and strength this will bring, the outward loves will manifest in ways you couldn’t have forced before. He has told us to love others as ourselves, so we must hold ourselves in value as we have been given a place of honor and glory in His heart. [17] He loves us enough that his son, who is an extension of Himself and created solely to suffer among us, was sacrificed so that no temptation nor sin would be able to keep us from Him. We are loved, every moment that we pray, he is listening.We will be forever forgiven, and so we must learn to love ourselves, through everything, because we are exactly as he wanted us, and loved, as His own children.

[1] I Corinthians 9:15-18
[2] I Samuel 15:22
[3] John 3:16
[4] Psalm 44:21
[5] Jeremiah 1:5
[6] 1 Thessalonians 4:9-12
[7] Malachi 3:8-12
[8] 1 Thessalonians 5:11-15
[9] Luke 12:32
[10] Psalm 136:16
[11] Hebrews 2:12
[12] Luke 12:7
[13] Isaiah 62:3
[14] Ephesians 3:17-18
[15] Philippians 1:6
[16] Romans 3:23-25
[17] Hebrews 2:7