Need more patience? Is generosity an elusive virtue? Having trouble putting up with ungrateful relatives or cranky neighbors? God puts up with you when you act the same.

Luke 6:35 says,

“But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back.”

Can’t we love like this? Not without God’s help we can’t. Our relationships need more than a social gesture. Some of our friends need a flood of tears. Our children need to be covered in the oil of our love.

But if we haven’t received these things ourselves, how can we give them to others? Jeremiah 17:9 reminds us that apart from God,

“the heart is deceitful about all things.”

We need help from an outside source. A transfusion. Would we love as God loves? Then we start by receiving God’s love!

By Max Lucado
Used by Permission
From: A Love Worth Giving

To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:    
https://maxlucado.com/about-max/

FURTHER READING

• Loving Sinners
• A Loving Habit
• New Love is Like a Drug

Learn more about knowing Jesus at: https://thoughtsaboutgod.com/four-laws/

The post Loving Like God Loves appeared first on Thoughts About God.

“But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.” Luke 6.27-30

These days we toss the word LOVE around so casually. “I love football games, and ham sandwiches. I love movies that make me laugh and cry. I love hamburgers and apple pie. I love my spouse. I love my kids. I love God.”

Jesus calls His followers to a love that is way beyond casual.

It’s Crazy. Supernatural. Foolish.

It’s a love that goes outside the norm and takes our breath away. A love that is costly and knows no limits. A love that is bold and unexpected. A love that is lavish and expects nothing in return.

We’re not only to love like this but we’re to love our ENEMIES like this!

Do we love the one who left us for someone else? The one who held our heart in their hands and carelessly discarded it? The one who stole our innocence? The one who emptied us of all we are emotionally, mentally and physically?

How can we love like this?

We can’t! Humanly speaking, it’s impossible to love like this. But our God is the God of the impossible. He specializes in doing the unexpected, the astonishing! And He has implanted this crazy, foolish, transcendent love in our hearts that enables us to do what we could never do on our own!

His love enables us to love extravagantly, unconditionally, lavishly! Will you open your heart to this love the Father has for you and then let it overflow into the hearts of your enemies and friends alike?

Lord, we readily admit that we are frail and human, that our pain and hurt often get in the way of our love. We need you. Our love is fickle but Your is faithful. Our love is conditional but Yours carries no conditions. Our love is frivolous but Yours is purposeful and extravagant. Teach us to love like You love. Amen.

Today, Find an opportunity to show Christlike love to someone you usually overlook.

Kristi Huseby
used by permission

FURTHER READING

• Loving as God Loves
• Examples of His Love
• Choosing Love over Rights

The post Impossible Love appeared first on Thoughts About God.

“If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing… And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” 1 Corinthians 13:3, 13

The headlines are full of stories about violence, tragedy, and suffering. Storms, cancer rates, mass shootings — it might feel impossible to believe that God can work in the midst of these tragedies. How can anything good come from something so horrible, we ask. As followers of Christ, these are the dark places into which we are called.

We are called to go to our neighbor who just lost her husband and is now a single mom; we are called to go to the marginalized groups who feel vulnerable, targeted and afraid; we are called to go to our estranged brother who just got diagnosed with cancer; we are called to go to the homeless camp on the edge of town.

But we aren’t called to go into the darkness alone; we are to carry Christ’s love with us, and lavish it on those who are suffering and in need. Good can come out of a community’s pain, out of a family’s grief, out of a person’s despair when the love of God moves His people to love and to serve them.

Without God’s love, we question whether it is worth it to go to the unsavory side of town; we wonder if new immigrants really care if we make the effort to visit them; we second guess whether we should bother picking up the phone to call our elderly neighbor.

With God’s love, we don’t ask, “Is it worth it?” but rather proclaim, “He is worth it!”

God, please fill me with faith to trust that You are good, hope to believe that You are working all things out for the good of those who love You, and the love of Christ, which moves me to be Your hands and feet to serve those in need. Amen.

By Caran Jantzen
Used by permission

www.thelife.com/dailydevotions

FURTHER READING

How to Love the Unlovable –  by Bill Bright

Keep a Soft Heart – by Gail Rodgers

The Condition of Our Hearts –  by Doug Lim

The post Is It Worth It? appeared first on Thoughts About God.

“By this all men will know you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:35

I have made many important discoveries and learned many valuable lessons in the course of my nearly 80 years.

I could write about my days of agnosticism when as a happy pagan I finally heard the Good News for the first time and fell in love with Jesus Christ. I could have told about the days when I first experienced the reality of the person of the Holy Spirit. I could share my discovery of how to introduce others to Christ as a way of life, or my realization that everybody hungers for God, even so-called atheists, because God created us that way. (Romans 1:19, 20)

However, having considered all of these possibilities, [the greatest lesson I ever learned is how to] love people who sometimes are difficult to love.

Why is this lesson important to me? Because God places a very strong emphasis on love in His Word. In fact, our Lord teaches us to

“love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind’ and to “love your neighbor as yourself.“

The Holy Spirit spoke through the Apostle Paul, that no matter what else we might accomplish in life, regardless of what we may contribute that is good and commendable, apart from love, it is of no value whatsoever.

In one instance, I was having difficulty loving a fellow staff member of Campus Crusade for Christ. But the Lord reminded me of 1 Peter 5:7,

“Let him have all your worries and cares, for He is always thinking about you and watching everything that concerns you” (TLB).

When I claimed God’s love for the man, by faith, my concern lifted. This man and I met later that afternoon and had the most wonderful time of prayer and fellowship we had ever experienced together. Loving with God’s love, by faith, had changed our relationship.

Perhaps you have been in a similar situation and wondered, “How can I really love that person?” I encourage you to make a list of those whom you don’t like and begin to love them by faith. Confess any wrong attitudes you may have about them. Ask the Holy Spirit to fill you with Christ’s love for each of them. Then seek to meet with them as you draw upon God’s limitless, inexhaustible, overwhelming love for them by faith. You will discover, as I have, that we can never run out of opportunities to love by faith.

Bible Reading: Hebrews 11:6

Thought: Commit to examining your relationships, asking the Lord who you need to express His love for. Take time to pray for that person, and your own attitude about them. Then contact them, and let them know you are praying for them.

by Dr. Bill Bright
Used by Permission

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The post How to Love the Unlovable appeared first on Thoughts About God.

Is your love growing softer, brighter and more visible? Or is it becoming more discriminating, more calculating, less vulnerable and less available? This is a very important issue, for your Christianity is only as real as your love. A measurable decrease in your ability to love is evidence that a stronghold of cold love is developing within you.

Jesus warned of our era. He said, “Many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold” (Matthew 24:10-12). So, let us honestly ask the Lord to examine us: Is our love hot or cold? Someone’s thoughtlessness may have wounded us deeply, but instead of forgiving the wound or going to them and discussing it according to Matthew 18, we go to others with our complaint. The wound then begins to germinate into a root of bitterness, and many are being defiled (Hebrews 12:15). What is growing in us is not love but bitterness, which is unfulfilled revenge.

Again, Jesus warned “that stumbling blocks [would] come” (Matthew 18:7). There will be times when even good people have bad days; there will never be a time when “stumbling blocks” cease to be found upon your path. Remember also, people do not stumble over boulders but over stones — little things. When you have stumbled over something, you’ve stopped walking.

Have you stumbled over someone’s weakness or sin lately? Have you gotten back up and continued loving as you did before, or has that fall caused you to withdraw from walking in love? To preserve the quality of your love, you must forgive those who have caused you to stumble. Depending on the issue itself, it may be that you legitimately cannot trust them, but you do not have a reason to stop loving.

Every time you refuse to forgive or fail to overlook a weakness in another, your heart not only hardens toward them, it hardens toward God. You may still think you are open to God, but the Scriptures are clear: “The one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1 John 4:20). You may not like what someone has done, but you do not have an option to stop loving them.

What do I mean by love? First, I do not merely mean “tough love.” I mean gentle, affectionate, sensitive, open, persistent love. God will be tough when He needs to be, and we will be firm when He tells us to be, but beneath our firmness must be an underground river of love waiting to spring into action. When I have love for someone, I have predetermined that I am going to stand with them, regardless of what they are going through. I am committed.

We each need people who love us, who are committed to us in spite of our imperfections. The fullness of Christ will not come without Christians standing with each other in love. We are not talking about salvation but growing in salvation until we care for each other, even as Christ has committed Himself to us.

The goal of pulling down the stronghold of cold love is to see our hearts restored to the heart of Christ. You will be challenged in this, but if you persist, you will discover the height and depth and breadth of Christ’s love. You will become “a body filled and flooded with God Himself” (Ephesian 3:19 Amp).

By Francis Frangipane
Used by Permission

Francis Frangipane
info@frangipane.org
www.frangipane.org
www.icitc.org
www.arrowbookstore.com

Learn more about knowing Jesus at: https://thoughtsaboutgod.com/four-laws/

The post The Stronghold of Cold Love appeared first on Thoughts About God.

Have you ever heard anyone gossip about someone you know? “Well, I heard that she. . .”  “Oh, but didn’t you know that he. . .”  Then all of a sudden it’s your turn. What do you have to say? Here’s what love says: 1 Peter 4:8 says “Love covers a multitude of sins.” Love doesn’t expose. It doesn’t gossip. If love says anything, it speaks words of protection.

Do you know anyone who needs protection? Of course you do. Then give some. Pay a gas bill for a struggling elderly couple. Make sure your divorced friends are invited to parties. Promise your kids that, God being your helper, they will never know a hungry day or a homeless night. In Matthew 25:4 Jesus says, “I tell you the truth, anything you did for even the least of my people here, you also did for me!”

By Max Lucado
From: A Love Worth Giving

Used by permission
To learn more about Max Lucado visit his website at:
https://maxlucado.com/about/

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The post What Love Says appeared first on Thoughts About God.