love you enemies

Love Your Enemies

Jesus was very specific as he spake to the disciples about this topic.  But even as followers of Christ, this area confronts us with much difficulty because we are still wrapped up in this barrier called flesh.  Nonetheless, we have been confronted with the responsibility to take our love to a higher level and show love to our enemies.  Like, actually look out for them.  Think of the example/standard we are setting in the world.  

What are some examples of loving our enemies?  Well, we can not only pray for them, but if they permit, we can pray with them about specific situations that may be weighing them down and genuinely want God to move on their behalf.  We can pay a bill for them, pick up groceries for them when they experience financial challenges, or clean their home when they are physically unable to.  This requires constant examination of our heart and intentions to ensure that we love them as if they were not an enemy, but instead a friend.

Affirmation: I will show unconditional love, even toward my enemies.

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You Are Not Your Own. 

“What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” 1 Corinthians‬ ‭6:19‬ ‭KJV

When you are in Christ, your body does not belong to you — it belongs to God. “Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.” 1 Corinthians‬ ‭6:18‬ ‭KJV.‬‬ 

Fornication is a sin directly against the body, the temple of the Holy Ghost. Not only is fornication a sin against your own body but you also grieve the Holy Spirit when you have sex outside of marriage. Sex is not only a physical act but it’s a spiritual covenant that brings two individuals together as one flesh. 

When sex is performed outside of marriage, it is an illegal spiritual trespass against your body and the Holy Spirit. Paul states, “All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not.” 1 Corinthians‬ ‭10:23‬ ‭KJV‬‬. The two may be consenting the act — it may be lawful, but fornication (sex outside of marriage) is a spiritual transgression against the body and against the Holy Ghost. 

Your body belongs to Him.

God wants us to find our way back to him

There’s Got to Be More

Do you ever have the feeling that you are chasing something in life that won’t fully satisfy you? Pay attention to that feeling. It’s from God.

We’re not just talking about substance abuse issues, although drinking and pursuing other addictions are certainly ways of chasing something futile. But we’ve also known a lot of “good church people” who sit in a service every week—or who preach from a pulpit to those people—who feel themselves to be far from God. They’re “successful” or “put together” or “righteous” on the outside, but they’re missing God on the inside. They keep busy with religious practices and work, school, or family, but it just isn’t enough. They long for God to feel real to them.

That longing is the first spiritual awakening for all of us finding our way back to God: “There’s got to be more.”

When you long for a love that is deep and satisfying, when you want to give yourself to something that will truly make a difference, or when you seek answers to life’s most difficult questions, you are looking for God. You’ve really got two options: you can keep searching to fill these longings on your own, or you can look to the One who gave you those longings in the first place.

Our longing for real love goes all the way back to how the human race was made in the first place. God intended that we experience his love both directly from him and through others we relate to in a healthy way. What we long for, God doesn’t just have but actually God is. He is love and he pursues us with love.

We’ve heard it said that every man who knocks on the door of a brothel is really looking for God. If you are knocking on the door of some self-destructive behavior or relationship, you might actually have arrived at an important point in your journey back to God. Why? Because the disappointment you inevitably feel in cheap substitutes will make you wonder where you can find real love. Will you open yourself up to letting God fill your longing to love and be loved?

What do your activities this week suggest about what you think will satisfy you?

Forgiveness

Forgiveness Is Not Justification 

Forgiveness can be a sensitive topic in the Church. It is often so because the word “forgiveness” has been misunderstood. First, it is important to know what forgiveness is not. It is true that some horrendous things have been done to certain people by others. Forgiveness does not mean justification of these things. To forgive a wrong does not mean that this wrong was not done to us. To forgive something does not make it excusable. When we forgive, it does not mean that we deny that what was done to us was enormous or hateful.

We can consider our own forgiveness by God. Does the fact that the Lord forgave us mean that we have never sinned? Are we saying that we have done nothing wrong when we receive Christ’s sacrifice? Are we saying that our sin was not enormous? Are we saying that we did not deserve condemnation? Nobody is saying that. What we are saying is that God gave us unimaginable grace in view of our colossal sin. Moreover, God has done that at His own cost. Christ laid down His own life to forgive us for our sins.

So I am not justifying what someone has done to me when I forgive them. I look their sin right in the face and I say, “This sin is enormous. It is worthy of death. However, I forgive this wrong because I have been forgiven.”We take a full account of what has been done to us when we forgive. Then, we choose to release the person who hurt us. 

Thinking that forgiveness is justification can be confusing. One can wonder: How can a just God say that sin was OK? How can He justify rape? Murder? Stealing? Betrayal? God does not justify those things. He calls them what they are. Then, He chooses the death of His Son as the price paid for them. The Bible says that the payment for sin is death. God does not justify sin. The reason He can forgive our sins is because Christ died in our place. He also died in the place of the people who sinned against us. The sacrifice of Christ is enough to pay for the sins we committed and the sins that were committed against us. Forgiveness is accepting the sacrifice of Christ as sufficient. It is not justifying sin. Forgiveness is accepting that each sin has been paid for in full by Christ.  

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Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Matthew 7:13‭-‬14 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/mat.7.13-14.KJV

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Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Matthew 7:13‭-‬14 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/mat.7.13-14.KJV

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Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. Matthew 6:34 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/mat.6.34.KJV