Soooo I really thought I had abandoned this blog. In fact, I made a conscious decision to. However, I changed my mind. I used to feel like I needed to please people with this thing, and that led me to stop blogging, but now I think I'm just going to keep it more private. I'm sort of rededicating this blog to myself and to whoever stumbles upon it. Hopefully, it will help anyone that finds it, but my intention is no longer to write this for a ton of people to read.
Bam. Onto what I want to write about. If you are familiar with me or this blog, you know that I had a major struggle with an identity crisis in high school, but God rescued me from that and showed me that my ONLY identity is that I am His son. I eliminated all of my other false identities right before entering college. So I thought...
My previous identities were eliminated away by having them identities ripped from me in some real manner, God speaking truth to me, and then me accepting that truth. This happened to my identity of being desirable to women, being popular, and being an athlete. However, there was one false identity that remained, and I didn't realize it until a few weeks ago...that I am a smart person.
There is a huge difference between me being a smart person and a person that is smart. Being smart is a quality about someone. Being a smart person is an identity. I was not a person who was smart, I was a smart person. However, until just recently, I thought that I had pushed this identity out. Then God revealed to me how foolish and blind I was.
When the semester started, my grades were on fire. I had never made A's on accounting tests like I was at the time. I was feeling good. Then, getting into the meat of the semester, the B's, C's, and even a strong D came around. And actually, no, there were no B's, just pretty little C's and that stupid D. After taking one particularly deGRADING (ha...ha...) test, I was walking and thinking to myself "man, Louie, what's wrong with you this semester? Why aren't you doing well on these tests? This isn't you, you're a smart person..."
If God hadn't thrown those words back in my face, I never would have caught them. I identified myself as something that I'm not after supposedly getting rid of that identity. I realized that that's the reason why all of those bad grades stung so badly. They weren't who I was. I was smart, and that identity wasn't reflected on those tests. That identity was attacked. And truth be told, I couldn't be happier as soon as I realized it. In my heart, I truly want to be nothing other than God's son. If this was how God had to banish this rival to His throne of my life, I didn't care how bad the process hurt.
It took a bunch of bad grades for God to bring me to my next step: eliminating my last realized false identity. When our identities are attacked, it hurts. The only way to survive these attacks is knowing God's truth, that you are His child and His alone, and choosing to rely on that truth. Now, I'm a former smart person. This doesn't mean that I will stop studying or that I will try to do poorly in school. That's just dumb. This means that if I do make some academic mistakes here and there, my true foundation will remain unshaken.
Sunday, December 15, 2013
Sunday, June 9, 2013
Feeling Unfulfilled? So Was I!
Something that I believe everyone struggles with, or has struggled with at some point, is a validity crisis. From my experience, this is something most people don't even think about or have even heard of, but it's such a serious problem, and Satan does a wonderful job of disguising it.
Before going any further, I want you to think abut how you are validated as a man or woman. Seriously, don't read another sentence until you think of a concrete source of YOUR validation. To encourage this, I'm going to skip some space just to make sure you do.
Once you've thought of that thing(s), hold on to that for a minute. To give you some examples of what I used to use to try to validate myself as a man or as even a human, I used to use friendships, social life, relationships, soccer, and grades, sometimes all at once and sometimes a combination of two or three at the same time. Keep in mind that this is all in retrospect and was completely unaware that I had succumb to trying to validate myself with these at the time.
With whatever you have been pursuing as your validation, how has that left you feeling? Do you feel validated? Personally, I never did. In fact, it was so bad in middle school that I went through a depression. Maybe there have been times when you have felt that you had validated yourself with one of these sources, but how long will that last? And when you do catch what you're looking for, does that satisfy you, or do you begin chasing something else? To make my point, and to be blunt about it, you can never pursue anything of these world and ultimately feel satisfied by it, and that's how I felt for years and years until the summer between my senior year of high school and my freshman year of college.
I was very mentally and emotionally worn out from chasing hollow and fleeting sources of validation. I was a Christian and had a relationship with Jesus, but He was always something I put at the back burner and never really gave Him the attention He deserved. However, it was during that summer that He revealed to me something that I identify as the second best turning point in my life (with the first being when I became a Christian): He revealed to me that HE is my validation. Jesus Christ, the creator of the universe and everyone and everything in it, loves me and wants a relationship with me. It's something I've known most of my life, but I never really grasped the importance of that concept. What other validation do I need other than Jesus, my best friend, loving me and having a relationship with me? I've had friendships fade. I have no girlfriend and am indifferently single. I was never a soccer superstar. I made my first "C" this past semester. All of the things I used to try to validate myself with have either faded or could fade. God is the only thing I know that, by nature, cannot fade. He's loved me when I've loved Him. He's loved me when I'm angry at Him. He's loved me when I feel distant from Him. He's loved me when I doubt Him.
If you find yourself unfulfilled with whatever your current pursuit is, I encourage you to allow Jesus to be your validation. There's nothing wrong with pursuing friendships or a little girlfriend or sports or a career or kittens or Pokémon or whatever else is out there. Personally, my goal is to have the original Pokérap memorized by the end of the summer. But it's not enough to just recognize that Jesus loves you. You have to fully accept it and put it into action with your life, and He'll be there forever.
And just so you guys know my struggles, this is what I'm working on memorizing.
Before going any further, I want you to think abut how you are validated as a man or woman. Seriously, don't read another sentence until you think of a concrete source of YOUR validation. To encourage this, I'm going to skip some space just to make sure you do.
Once you've thought of that thing(s), hold on to that for a minute. To give you some examples of what I used to use to try to validate myself as a man or as even a human, I used to use friendships, social life, relationships, soccer, and grades, sometimes all at once and sometimes a combination of two or three at the same time. Keep in mind that this is all in retrospect and was completely unaware that I had succumb to trying to validate myself with these at the time.
With whatever you have been pursuing as your validation, how has that left you feeling? Do you feel validated? Personally, I never did. In fact, it was so bad in middle school that I went through a depression. Maybe there have been times when you have felt that you had validated yourself with one of these sources, but how long will that last? And when you do catch what you're looking for, does that satisfy you, or do you begin chasing something else? To make my point, and to be blunt about it, you can never pursue anything of these world and ultimately feel satisfied by it, and that's how I felt for years and years until the summer between my senior year of high school and my freshman year of college.
I was very mentally and emotionally worn out from chasing hollow and fleeting sources of validation. I was a Christian and had a relationship with Jesus, but He was always something I put at the back burner and never really gave Him the attention He deserved. However, it was during that summer that He revealed to me something that I identify as the second best turning point in my life (with the first being when I became a Christian): He revealed to me that HE is my validation. Jesus Christ, the creator of the universe and everyone and everything in it, loves me and wants a relationship with me. It's something I've known most of my life, but I never really grasped the importance of that concept. What other validation do I need other than Jesus, my best friend, loving me and having a relationship with me? I've had friendships fade. I have no girlfriend and am indifferently single. I was never a soccer superstar. I made my first "C" this past semester. All of the things I used to try to validate myself with have either faded or could fade. God is the only thing I know that, by nature, cannot fade. He's loved me when I've loved Him. He's loved me when I'm angry at Him. He's loved me when I feel distant from Him. He's loved me when I doubt Him.
If you find yourself unfulfilled with whatever your current pursuit is, I encourage you to allow Jesus to be your validation. There's nothing wrong with pursuing friendships or a little girlfriend or sports or a career or kittens or Pokémon or whatever else is out there. Personally, my goal is to have the original Pokérap memorized by the end of the summer. But it's not enough to just recognize that Jesus loves you. You have to fully accept it and put it into action with your life, and He'll be there forever.
Sunday, May 26, 2013
Some Reflections on the Past Couple of Years
Since I haven't posted a blog in three weeks, I figured I'd take a minute to write one not to give advice or share what I've been learning like I normally do, but just to give a shout out to the Big Man upstairs. I want to take some time to be thankful and give praise where praise is due.
First of all, I just want to thank God for where I am right now. If you knew me in high school, you know that I could have been on the opposite end of the spectrum from where I am right now. I could be living for happiness instead of joy. The summer between my senior year of high school and freshman year of college, God jumped in my hardcore and showed me that my identity and validity are both found in Him, and I identify that as one of the major turning points in my life. Now, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else except closer to Him.
Second, I'm EXTREMELY thankful for the incredible communities I've found. I am blessed enough to be going to school with some friends that I've known for a really long time as well to have met some incredible people at Clemson. I also have amazing friends outside of school who I don't know what I would do without.
Third, I'm thankful for the present. I will never be satisfied with where I am, and I will always strive to improve all aspects of my life, but I'm in a really great place right now. This is so meaningful to me because I have a tendency that when I leave Clemson for extended periods of time, I feel like my life goes backwards. I fall away from God; I get lazy; I get unmotivated; I make stupid mistakes. I'm not saying that some of those things may not come in spurts, but so far, this summer has been a time of growth. I've become aware of several of Satan's footholds that he has in my life, and I am working to smooth those out. To be specific, God has revealed to me that I need to work on my relationship with Griffin, my brother. Satan so often uses that to bring me down, but God doesn't want that for me. Overall, God has been pushing me forward, and it's been an unusual, awesome summer because of that.
I know, I guess this post was more for myself than for others, but it's something that I really wanted to acknowledge. I really miss so many of my friends that I'm not able to see, but I'm in a good place right now. For that, I can't be more thankful.
First of all, I just want to thank God for where I am right now. If you knew me in high school, you know that I could have been on the opposite end of the spectrum from where I am right now. I could be living for happiness instead of joy. The summer between my senior year of high school and freshman year of college, God jumped in my hardcore and showed me that my identity and validity are both found in Him, and I identify that as one of the major turning points in my life. Now, I wouldn't want to be anywhere else except closer to Him.
Second, I'm EXTREMELY thankful for the incredible communities I've found. I am blessed enough to be going to school with some friends that I've known for a really long time as well to have met some incredible people at Clemson. I also have amazing friends outside of school who I don't know what I would do without.
Third, I'm thankful for the present. I will never be satisfied with where I am, and I will always strive to improve all aspects of my life, but I'm in a really great place right now. This is so meaningful to me because I have a tendency that when I leave Clemson for extended periods of time, I feel like my life goes backwards. I fall away from God; I get lazy; I get unmotivated; I make stupid mistakes. I'm not saying that some of those things may not come in spurts, but so far, this summer has been a time of growth. I've become aware of several of Satan's footholds that he has in my life, and I am working to smooth those out. To be specific, God has revealed to me that I need to work on my relationship with Griffin, my brother. Satan so often uses that to bring me down, but God doesn't want that for me. Overall, God has been pushing me forward, and it's been an unusual, awesome summer because of that.
I know, I guess this post was more for myself than for others, but it's something that I really wanted to acknowledge. I really miss so many of my friends that I'm not able to see, but I'm in a good place right now. For that, I can't be more thankful.
Friday, May 3, 2013
Your Prayers Could Be Powerful. COULD Be.
I've been trying to be obedient lately, so this is me beginning a new blog post at 12:30 at night the day before I move out of my apartment. I really felt God tell me to write this right now, and exactly what to right it on. Yes, I resisted at first, but I really felt God's tug to go ahead and write this about a specific subject.
Due to the time I'm writing this, I'm sure you can guess that I was in the middle of prayer when I felt God put it on my heart to create this blog. I had a really powerful moment, but let me rewind a week to get you up to this point.
Last Friday night, God performed a straight up miracle, and lucky for me it was on me! I was at a prayer meeting with some really amazing people, and we were going to do some ministry outreach later. When we began, everyone went around the room and laid out everything on their minds that was bothering them. It became clear to me very fast that Satan had been attacking each of us a lot before we got there because everyone had serious problems going on, including physical pain. I also was in quite a bit of physical pain, but I said nothing about it. For those of you that don't know, I have had scholiosis and two bulging discs in my spine since the end of my junior year of high school and it causes me perpetual pain. I just choose and chose that night not to talk about it because it's seriously all the time...until that night. When everyone had gotten everything off their chests with what was bothering them, we all began to pray for one another. While a few others guys and I were praying for a girl with a migraine, one of the guys said "I command all pain to leave in the name of Jesus." He wasn't even praying for me, but in that moment, I felt GOD'S PHYSICAL PRESENCE like I haven't never felt before. I felt Him touch me, and a massive wave of peace came over my body. Before I even moved to check, I knew what God had done. As soon as the prayer was over, my suspicion was confirmed: I moved my back, arms, and neck (which all induce my back pain), and I FELT NOTHING. No pain at all in my back. It had been three years since my back had felt that way, so yes I was very emotional and so so so thankful to the Great Physician. That night and this whole week, I have felt no pain or soreness in my back which should be medically impossible. If you are a little suspicious, I understand. I would be too if it didn't happen to me, but it did, and I couldn't be more thankful.
I know that was a long story, and I could even go on longer (I'll spare you), but let's fast forward to today. I don't know why, but today the pain and soreness returned to my back. When God healed me last Friday, I didn't know how long He would choose to keep my pain away. I hoped it would be forever, but it wasn't. I have felt very sore all day.
Let's fast forward again a few hours to tonight, right before I began writing this post. I started praying right before I went to bed and just sort of went through the motions telling God what I wished for and what I'm thankful for. However, the pain in my back was pretty distracting, so I prayed that God would take away the pain again. I knew He had done it once, so I hoped He would do it again. There's something wrong with that last sentence though. I hoped He would heal me again. Last week, when I felt God's touch, I knew He had healed me. I realized my lack of faith in that moment, so I got out of my mundane position of lying on my back, sat up, opened my eyes, and proclaimed out loud, "God, take away this pain again."
This time, I had an expectation. I didn't hope God would heal me so that if He didn't, I could just say that it wasn't in His will. This time, I threw out any excuses as to why God wouldn't take away the pain tonight just like He did last week. And you know what? HE DID. About half an hour ago, God released me from the pain that had been consuming me all day. I moved around expecting to be healed, and God didn't let me down.
As I've said before, the point of this post is NOT to give me glory. I didn't do anything! My Father in Heaven performed the same miracle on me twice in a week. I'm just really lucky to be blessed like this. However, God did teach me something in this moment. I have to break the monotony of nightly prayer and engage with Him. If I take the time to pray something, I need to expect that God will come through and actually envision my prayer's occurrence. None of the other paragraphs are as important as this one because THIS message applies to YOU! Don't just pray, talk to God and have a serious conversation with Him. As long as you remain in His will, your prayers will be granted.
"And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him." 1 John 5:14-15.
Due to the time I'm writing this, I'm sure you can guess that I was in the middle of prayer when I felt God put it on my heart to create this blog. I had a really powerful moment, but let me rewind a week to get you up to this point.
Last Friday night, God performed a straight up miracle, and lucky for me it was on me! I was at a prayer meeting with some really amazing people, and we were going to do some ministry outreach later. When we began, everyone went around the room and laid out everything on their minds that was bothering them. It became clear to me very fast that Satan had been attacking each of us a lot before we got there because everyone had serious problems going on, including physical pain. I also was in quite a bit of physical pain, but I said nothing about it. For those of you that don't know, I have had scholiosis and two bulging discs in my spine since the end of my junior year of high school and it causes me perpetual pain. I just choose and chose that night not to talk about it because it's seriously all the time...until that night. When everyone had gotten everything off their chests with what was bothering them, we all began to pray for one another. While a few others guys and I were praying for a girl with a migraine, one of the guys said "I command all pain to leave in the name of Jesus." He wasn't even praying for me, but in that moment, I felt GOD'S PHYSICAL PRESENCE like I haven't never felt before. I felt Him touch me, and a massive wave of peace came over my body. Before I even moved to check, I knew what God had done. As soon as the prayer was over, my suspicion was confirmed: I moved my back, arms, and neck (which all induce my back pain), and I FELT NOTHING. No pain at all in my back. It had been three years since my back had felt that way, so yes I was very emotional and so so so thankful to the Great Physician. That night and this whole week, I have felt no pain or soreness in my back which should be medically impossible. If you are a little suspicious, I understand. I would be too if it didn't happen to me, but it did, and I couldn't be more thankful.
I know that was a long story, and I could even go on longer (I'll spare you), but let's fast forward to today. I don't know why, but today the pain and soreness returned to my back. When God healed me last Friday, I didn't know how long He would choose to keep my pain away. I hoped it would be forever, but it wasn't. I have felt very sore all day.
Let's fast forward again a few hours to tonight, right before I began writing this post. I started praying right before I went to bed and just sort of went through the motions telling God what I wished for and what I'm thankful for. However, the pain in my back was pretty distracting, so I prayed that God would take away the pain again. I knew He had done it once, so I hoped He would do it again. There's something wrong with that last sentence though. I hoped He would heal me again. Last week, when I felt God's touch, I knew He had healed me. I realized my lack of faith in that moment, so I got out of my mundane position of lying on my back, sat up, opened my eyes, and proclaimed out loud, "God, take away this pain again."
This time, I had an expectation. I didn't hope God would heal me so that if He didn't, I could just say that it wasn't in His will. This time, I threw out any excuses as to why God wouldn't take away the pain tonight just like He did last week. And you know what? HE DID. About half an hour ago, God released me from the pain that had been consuming me all day. I moved around expecting to be healed, and God didn't let me down.
As I've said before, the point of this post is NOT to give me glory. I didn't do anything! My Father in Heaven performed the same miracle on me twice in a week. I'm just really lucky to be blessed like this. However, God did teach me something in this moment. I have to break the monotony of nightly prayer and engage with Him. If I take the time to pray something, I need to expect that God will come through and actually envision my prayer's occurrence. None of the other paragraphs are as important as this one because THIS message applies to YOU! Don't just pray, talk to God and have a serious conversation with Him. As long as you remain in His will, your prayers will be granted.
"And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him." 1 John 5:14-15.
Sunday, April 28, 2013
We're Just Babies
A very close friend of mine recently brought to my attention something that I've thought about before, but always took the answer for granted: he didn't understand why he needs God.
Yes, the obvious is true; the friend who asked this is not a Christian. He is one of my best friends in the whole world and I cannot wait until he meets my best BEST friend, but why should he? If you're not already a Christian, what would make you want to be? What would make you want to learn about a guy that people talk about, but doesn't really seem to have much impact on you. You go about your day looking relatively like anyone else, but you don't know Jesus and you're just fine? Well the simple answer is that there is more to be had in this life than being "just fine."
I'll begin to answer this with another question. It's a big question, and to answer it fully takes more time and wisdom than I have: "why did God create humans?" There are so many different answers to this question, and more than one are true. However, I'm convinced of one thing: I believe God creates relationships between humans to illustrate our relationship with Him.
For example, I can't think of a better humanly relationship to answer this than the relationship between children and their parents. Why the heck would parents want children? They're gross, they whine, they poop too much, they cost a lot of time and money, and, on paper, they're essentially worthless. Yet, the weird thing is that despite all of these horrible reasons to have a baby, they're everywhere. And don't argue with me that it's just because parents like having sex. There are ways to do that and prevent children. Children are everywhere because despite knowing how much work children will be and how frustrating they are going to be, parents want them to love them.
What is there to love in a baby? In my opinion, not much. And if you didn't know that a guy is the author of this blog, I'm sure you figured it out by now. However, children are part of their parents. They come from them, just as we all come from God. God loves us even when we break His heart, cause trouble, and are just messy and nasty. How is that so unrealistic, though, when God shows us that that's possible between humans? God made us TO BE WITH HIM AND TO BE LOVED BY HIM AND TO LOVE HIM BACK.
We are made, wired, and built to be with God, even if we think we are "just fine" without Him. This isn't something I could prove. In my opinion, I don't even think people need to "prove" to others that God exists based on facts. We just need to prove that He exists based on love and how He loves THROUGH us. God has shown me so much love since meeting Him that I can't explain, because I have about as much value to Him as a baby does to its parents. Yet, I'm loved anyways.
A common answer to the question of why we need God is "to get into Heaven." This is a wonderful reason, but is that it? I just really think that there's more to it than just that. Heaven is paradise, but you know what real paradise is? Being in the presence of the Lord, which is what Heaven is! That's better than any earthly pleasures that we can receive. Eternity doesn't start when we're born. Eternity starts the moment we "declare with [our] mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in [our] heart that God raised him from the dead."
Yes, the obvious is true; the friend who asked this is not a Christian. He is one of my best friends in the whole world and I cannot wait until he meets my best BEST friend, but why should he? If you're not already a Christian, what would make you want to be? What would make you want to learn about a guy that people talk about, but doesn't really seem to have much impact on you. You go about your day looking relatively like anyone else, but you don't know Jesus and you're just fine? Well the simple answer is that there is more to be had in this life than being "just fine."
I'll begin to answer this with another question. It's a big question, and to answer it fully takes more time and wisdom than I have: "why did God create humans?" There are so many different answers to this question, and more than one are true. However, I'm convinced of one thing: I believe God creates relationships between humans to illustrate our relationship with Him.
For example, I can't think of a better humanly relationship to answer this than the relationship between children and their parents. Why the heck would parents want children? They're gross, they whine, they poop too much, they cost a lot of time and money, and, on paper, they're essentially worthless. Yet, the weird thing is that despite all of these horrible reasons to have a baby, they're everywhere. And don't argue with me that it's just because parents like having sex. There are ways to do that and prevent children. Children are everywhere because despite knowing how much work children will be and how frustrating they are going to be, parents want them to love them.
What is there to love in a baby? In my opinion, not much. And if you didn't know that a guy is the author of this blog, I'm sure you figured it out by now. However, children are part of their parents. They come from them, just as we all come from God. God loves us even when we break His heart, cause trouble, and are just messy and nasty. How is that so unrealistic, though, when God shows us that that's possible between humans? God made us TO BE WITH HIM AND TO BE LOVED BY HIM AND TO LOVE HIM BACK.
We are made, wired, and built to be with God, even if we think we are "just fine" without Him. This isn't something I could prove. In my opinion, I don't even think people need to "prove" to others that God exists based on facts. We just need to prove that He exists based on love and how He loves THROUGH us. God has shown me so much love since meeting Him that I can't explain, because I have about as much value to Him as a baby does to its parents. Yet, I'm loved anyways.
A common answer to the question of why we need God is "to get into Heaven." This is a wonderful reason, but is that it? I just really think that there's more to it than just that. Heaven is paradise, but you know what real paradise is? Being in the presence of the Lord, which is what Heaven is! That's better than any earthly pleasures that we can receive. Eternity doesn't start when we're born. Eternity starts the moment we "declare with [our] mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in [our] heart that God raised him from the dead."
Sunday, April 14, 2013
LOVELOVELOVELOVELOVE! I'm Not Asking You, I'm Telling You
"Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on LOVE, which binds them all together in perfect unity."
These verses are from Colossians 3:12-14. I can see the underlined verse, verse 14, translated three different ways: love is greater than all of the previous virtues (compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience), love should be incorporated with each of the virtues, or a combination of both. No matter what way you look at it, God places a pretty dang high priority on love. This is something that He slammed me with pretty recently, and I'm very convinced that love is one of, if not the most, important quality of being a Christian.
The topic of love is way too complex for me to dig into with just one blog post, but I want to take it apart just a little bit. As I have said before, God is love. He loves us even when we have nothing inside of us worth loving. We turn our backs on Him every day multiple times a day, but He continues to passionately love us beyond description.
Some other examples of the importance of love are Proverbs 10:12, 1 Corinthians 13:13, 1 Peter 4:8, and the whole section of 1 John 4:7-21. You can take a minute to read these if you want, but I just want you to know that they're there to back up my point. We don't need to wait for somebody to love us before we love them. God didn't wait for us to love Him. In fact, He loved us before time began. We didn't even have a chance to love Him before He beat us to it! If us as Christians, myself included, could love unconditionally, we would be such a dangerous force in our respective communities.
I seriously can't stress enough about how important I believe love is. In fact, I believe every task and quality that God wishes for us becomes infinitely easier once we begin to love, and this brings us closer to Him. This type of thinking is what inspired me to give my blog its name, and before anything else, I want to be remembered as somebody that loved others. I'm definitely not there yet, and I'll never get to where I want to be, but the more we let God into our lives, the more His love will shine through us. That's greater than any love that could come from me, and I want that spewing onto everyone around me, just like God floods me with that love every single day.
These verses are from Colossians 3:12-14. I can see the underlined verse, verse 14, translated three different ways: love is greater than all of the previous virtues (compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience), love should be incorporated with each of the virtues, or a combination of both. No matter what way you look at it, God places a pretty dang high priority on love. This is something that He slammed me with pretty recently, and I'm very convinced that love is one of, if not the most, important quality of being a Christian.
The topic of love is way too complex for me to dig into with just one blog post, but I want to take it apart just a little bit. As I have said before, God is love. He loves us even when we have nothing inside of us worth loving. We turn our backs on Him every day multiple times a day, but He continues to passionately love us beyond description.
Some other examples of the importance of love are Proverbs 10:12, 1 Corinthians 13:13, 1 Peter 4:8, and the whole section of 1 John 4:7-21. You can take a minute to read these if you want, but I just want you to know that they're there to back up my point. We don't need to wait for somebody to love us before we love them. God didn't wait for us to love Him. In fact, He loved us before time began. We didn't even have a chance to love Him before He beat us to it! If us as Christians, myself included, could love unconditionally, we would be such a dangerous force in our respective communities.
I seriously can't stress enough about how important I believe love is. In fact, I believe every task and quality that God wishes for us becomes infinitely easier once we begin to love, and this brings us closer to Him. This type of thinking is what inspired me to give my blog its name, and before anything else, I want to be remembered as somebody that loved others. I'm definitely not there yet, and I'll never get to where I want to be, but the more we let God into our lives, the more His love will shine through us. That's greater than any love that could come from me, and I want that spewing onto everyone around me, just like God floods me with that love every single day.
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Easter Observations
"But He was pierced because of our transgressions, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on Him, and we are healed by His wounds. We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the Lord has punished Him for the iniquity of us all."
This is from the book of Isaiah, chapter 53 verses 5-6. This is historically dated to have been written over seven hundred years before Jesus came to earth. Pretty breathtaking, isn't it?
If the prophet Isaiah, a man, knew Jesus would be killed, shouldn't Jesus, God Himself embodied as a man, know it would happen just the day before? Matthew 26:2 says "'As you know, the Passover is two days away-and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.'" These words came from Jesus' mouth. If He knew He was about to die, why didn't He take action? Why didn't He run? Here's the answer: because of His intense, unfathomable, complex, deep love for us.
Most everyone knows why Jesus died. He died to save us of our sins. You don't even have to ask a Christian to get the answer to that question. That's an amazing act of love, but there are some small details that amaze me just as much. Jesus had every opportunity to save Himself, but He CHOSE TO LET HIMSELF BE KILLED.
The mere fact that He knew His death was coming means that He could have at least run away and tried to hide from the crowd sent by the priests to arrest Jesus. He let Himself be arrested.
At the Jesus' last supper, He called out Judas as the one that would betray Him. Instead of leaping across the table and beating the Heaven out of him, Jesus fed him, gave him drink, and allowed him to leave and gather the crowd to arrest Jesus.
When one of Jesus' disciples cut off the ear of a servant sent by the high priest, Jesus reattached that ear. He told the disciple to put down the sword, thus protecting and loving His enemies. (Oh yeah and by the way, Jesus mentions that His Father could have sent twelve legions of angels to save Him if He'd wished. I don't think He really needed His disciple's protection.)
When the high priest of the Jews was accusing Jesus of many different crimes, Jesus didn't say a word in return to defend Himself.
Even when Jesus was hanging on the cross, Luke 23:34 says He prayed for the people that put Him up there.
Jesus had all of these opportunities to save Himself, but instead He chose to allow Himself to be crucified to save us. With all of those options, Jesus displayed His love for us and for the individuals in the story time and time again. That's a love that couldn't be destroyed and that still presides over all of us two thousand years later.
This is from the book of Isaiah, chapter 53 verses 5-6. This is historically dated to have been written over seven hundred years before Jesus came to earth. Pretty breathtaking, isn't it?
If the prophet Isaiah, a man, knew Jesus would be killed, shouldn't Jesus, God Himself embodied as a man, know it would happen just the day before? Matthew 26:2 says "'As you know, the Passover is two days away-and the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified.'" These words came from Jesus' mouth. If He knew He was about to die, why didn't He take action? Why didn't He run? Here's the answer: because of His intense, unfathomable, complex, deep love for us.
Most everyone knows why Jesus died. He died to save us of our sins. You don't even have to ask a Christian to get the answer to that question. That's an amazing act of love, but there are some small details that amaze me just as much. Jesus had every opportunity to save Himself, but He CHOSE TO LET HIMSELF BE KILLED.
The mere fact that He knew His death was coming means that He could have at least run away and tried to hide from the crowd sent by the priests to arrest Jesus. He let Himself be arrested.
At the Jesus' last supper, He called out Judas as the one that would betray Him. Instead of leaping across the table and beating the Heaven out of him, Jesus fed him, gave him drink, and allowed him to leave and gather the crowd to arrest Jesus.
When one of Jesus' disciples cut off the ear of a servant sent by the high priest, Jesus reattached that ear. He told the disciple to put down the sword, thus protecting and loving His enemies. (Oh yeah and by the way, Jesus mentions that His Father could have sent twelve legions of angels to save Him if He'd wished. I don't think He really needed His disciple's protection.)
When the high priest of the Jews was accusing Jesus of many different crimes, Jesus didn't say a word in return to defend Himself.
Even when Jesus was hanging on the cross, Luke 23:34 says He prayed for the people that put Him up there.
Jesus had all of these opportunities to save Himself, but instead He chose to allow Himself to be crucified to save us. With all of those options, Jesus displayed His love for us and for the individuals in the story time and time again. That's a love that couldn't be destroyed and that still presides over all of us two thousand years later.
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